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TRIAL 



OF 



JOH]^ Y. BEALL, 



AS A 



SPY AND GUERRILLERO, 



•..BY MILITAHY OOMMISSIOK 



NEW YORK: 
B. APPLETON AND COMPAJ^Y, 

443 & 445 BROADWAY. 

1865. 






,{;>GHAr<ucu.. 



HISTOPiY OF THE WORLD. 

BY 

PHILIP SMITH, B.A. 

PLAN OF THE WORK. 

SixcE Sir Walter Ealeigli solaced his imprisonment in the Tower by the 
composition of his "History of the World," the Literature of England has 
never achieved the work which he left unfinished. There have been " Uni- 
versal Histories," from the bulk of an encyclopedia to the most meagre out- 
line, in which the annals of each nation are separately recorded; but without 
an attempt to trace the story of Divine Providence and human progress in 
one connected narrative. It is proposed to supply this want by a work, con- 
densed enough to keep it within a reasonable size, but yet so full as to be 
free from the dry baldness of an epitome. The literature of Germany 
abounds in histories, — such as those of Muller, Schlosser, Karl von Rotteck, 
Duncker, and others, — which at once prove the demand for such a book, and 
furnish models, in some degree, for its execution. But even those great 
works are somewhat deficient in that organic iinity which is the chief aim 
of this "History of the AVorld." 

The story of our whole race, like that of each separate nation, has " a 
beginning, a middle, and an end." That story we propose to follow, from its 
beginning in the sacred records, and from the dawn of civilization in the 
East, — through the successive Oriental Empires, — the rise of liberty and the 
perfection of heathen pohty, arts, and literature in Greece and Eome, — the 
change which passed over the face of the world when the light of Christi- 
anity sprung up, — the origin and first appearance of those barbarian races 
which overthrew both divisions of the Roman Empire, — the annals of the 
States which rose on the Empire's ruins, including the picturesque details of 
medieval history and the steady progress of modern liberty and civilization, 
— and the extension of these influences, by discovery, conquest, colonization, 
and Christian missions, to the remotest regions of the earth. In a word, as 
separate histories reflect the detached scenes of human action and suff'ering, 
our aim is to bring into one view the several parts which assuredly form one 
great whole, moving onwards, under the guidance of Divine Providence, to 
the unknown end ordained in the Divine purposes. 

Such a work, to be really useful, must be condensed into a moderate com- 
pass ; else the powers of the writer would be frittered away, and the atten- 
tion of the reader Avearied out by an overwhelming bulk, filled up with 
microscopic details. The more striking facts of history, — the rise and fall 
of empires, — the achievements of warriors and heroes, — the struggles of 
peoples for their rights and freedom, — the conflict between priestcraft and 
religious liberty, — must needs stand out on the canvas of such a picture with 
the prominence they claim in the world itself. But they will not divert our 



9^' 



/ 

TRIAL 

OF 



JOHN Yt^BEALL 



AS A 



SPY AND GUEEEILLEEO, 



BY MILITAEY OOMMISSIOK 



NEW YORK: 
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 

443 & 445 BROADWAY. 

1865. 



E^ro 



.'33(s> 



M.T. Pub. Ub, 




PEOCEEDINGS 



IN THE 



CASE OF JOHI^ T. BEALL 



Special Orders ) 

No. 14. ) Headquarters Department of the East, ) 

New York City, Jan. VltTi, 1865. ) 

6. A Military Commission, to consist of the following named 
officers, will assemble at Fort Lafayette, N. Y. H., at 11 a.m., on 
Friday, January 20tli, 1865, or as soon thereafter as practicable, for 
the trial of such cases as may be brought before it, by orders from these 
Headquarters, to sit without regard to hours, and to hold its sessions 
in New York City, if the convenience of the service require it ; four 
members to constitute a quorum, for the transaction of business. 

Detail for the Court. 

Brig. General Fitz Henry Warren, U. S. V. 

" W. H. Morris, U. S. V. 

Colonel M. S. Howe, 3d U. S. Cav. 

H. Day, U. S. A. 
Brev. Lieut. Col. R. F. O'Bierne, 14th U. S. Lifantry. 
Major G. W. Wallace, 6th U. S. Infantry. 
Major John A. Bolles, A. D. C, is appointed Judge Advocate. 

By command of Major Gen. Dix. 
D. T. Van Buren, 
Assistant Adjutant General. 



4 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

Fort Lafayette, New York Harbor, i 
11 o'clock A.M., Friday, Jan. 20t7i, 1865. ) 

The Commission constituted and convened by the foregoing order, 
met in obedience thereto. 

Present, all the members, namely : t 

Brig. General Fitz Henry Warren, U. S. V. 

" W. H. Morris, U. S. V. 

Colonel M. S. Howe, 3d U. S. Cav. 
Colonel H. Day, U. S. Army. 

Brev. Lieut. Col. R. F. O'Bierne, 14th U. S. Infantry. 
Major G. W. Wallace, 6th U. S. Infantry. 
Present, also, the Judge Advocate, and John Y. Beall, the ac- 
cused, who was brought in for trial. 

The foregoing order was read aloud in presence and hearing of the 
accused ; and he being asked if he objected to any member named in 
the detail, answered that he did not, but that he desired to protest 
against being tried by any Military Commission. 

In presence and hearing of the accused, the Commission was then 
duly sworn by the Judge Advocate, the Judge Advocate by the Presi- 
dent, and James E. Munson as Stenographer and Clerk to the Com- 
mission, by the Judge Advocate. 

The Judge Advocate inquired of the accused if he was ready to 
proceed to trial, and he answered that he was not, but desired time to 
procure counsel and prepare for his defence. At his request the Com- 
mission granted him until 11 o'clock a.m., Wednesday, January 25th, 
and the trial was postponed accordingly. 

The Commission then adjourned to meet to-morrow, January 21st, 
at the Department Headquarters, New York City, at 12 o'clock m., for 
the purpose of commencing the trial of Harris Hoyt. 

John A. Bolles, Maj. and A.D.C., 

Judge Advocate. 



Fort L afayette. New York Harbor, » 

11 o'clock A.M., Wednesday, Jan. 2oth, 1865. ) 

The Commission met pursuant to adjournment. Present, all the 
members. 

Present, also, the Judge Advocate, and the accused, John Y. Beall, 
who was brought in for trial. 

The record of the proceedings of January 20th was read by the 
Judge Advocate, and approved. 



TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 5 

The Judge Advocate asked the accused if he was ready to pro^ 
ceed to trial, to which the accused answered that he had written for 
counsel ; that he had handed the letter to Colonel Burke, but had re- 
ceived no answer. 

The Judge Advocate said that the letter referred to by the accused 
was delivered to him on the 20th of January, by Colonel Burke ; that 
he carried it that day to Mr. Brady's Office, it being addressed to that 
gentleman ; that Mr. Brady being out, he handed it to Mr. Traphagen, 
who said that if it was possible Mr. Brady would attend to the case ; if 
not, Mr. Brady or he (Mr. Traphagen) would endeavor to procure 
competent counsel to come down and consult with Capt. Beall ; and he 
then wrote a pass for Mr. Brady, or any other member of the bar, to 
visit the fort at any and all times, as counsel for Capt. Beall, and that 
he had this morning received the following note from Mr. Brady : 

January 23, 1865. 

Major John A. Bolles, 

My Dear Sm : — I am very much obliged to you for 
your courtesy and consideration in regard to the case at Fort Lafayette. 
Unfortunately the trial I have in the Superior Court has commenced, 
and I must attend to it from day to day. I have sought to procure 
other counsel for Mr. Beall, but cannot at present obtain any whom I can 
in all respects commend. I trust it may not be inconsistent with the 
public interest to postpone the trial at Fort Lafayette for a week. I send 
this by my friend William H. Ryan, Esq. 

Yours truly, 

James T. Brady. 

Mr. Ryan being present, the Commission inquired of him if Mr. Brady 
would be able to be present and act as counsel for thfe accused, in case 
the trial were adjourned for one week ; and Mr. Ryan answered that he 
would. 

The Judge Advocate exhibited to the accused three letters which 
purported to come from him, and which were addressed to persons in 
Toronto, Canada West, and in Richmond, Ya., and informed the accus- 
ed that, if he would reduce to writing in the form of an affidavit a state- 
ment of the facts he expected to prove by the persons or documents 
named in those letters, he should probably admit that the witnesses or 
documents, if presented in Court, would so say, and thus save the Gov- 
ernment the delay, and the accused the trouble and expense of getting 
them here. 

The accused stated that he wrote the letters, and that he would 



6 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

prepare the statement suggested, and so far as Mr. Brady was concern- 
ed, would be ready for trial on Wednesday, February 1st. 

On motion of a member of the Commission, the application of the 
accused for delay was granted, and the trial was postponed until Wed- 
nesday at 11 o'clock A.M., February 1st, 1865, with the understanding 
that at that time the trial should proceed. 

The Commission then adjourned until to-morrow, January 26th, at 
12 o'clock M., to meet at Department Headquarters ft>r the transaction 
of other business. 

John A. Bolles, Major and A.D.C., 

Judge Advocate. 



Fort Lafayette, New York Harbor, | 
11 o'clock A.M., Wednesday, Feb. 1st, 1865. \ 

The Commission met pursuant to adjournment. 

Present all the members. 

Present, also, the Judge Advocate, and the accused John Y. Beall, 
who was brought in for trial. 

By leave of the Commission James T. Brady, Esq., appeared as 
counsel for the accused. 

The Judge Advocate inquired of the accused if he was ready to 
plead to the charges and specifications, and the accused answered that 
he was. 

The accused was then arraigned on the following charges and 
specifications, which were read aloud in his presence and hearing, and 
to which after they were so read the accused pleaded that he was not 
gmlty. 

CHARGES AND SPECIFICATIONS AGAINST JOHN Y. 

BEALL 

Chaege 1st. Violation of the laws of luar. 

Specification 1. In this that John Y. Beall, a citizen of the insur- 
gent State of Virginia, did on or about the 19th day of September, 1864^ 
at or near Kelly's Island, in the State of Ohio, without lawful aui 
thority, and by force of arms, seize and capture the Steamboat Philo 
Parsons. 

Specification 2. In this that John Y. BeaU, a citizen of the in- 
surgent State of Virginia, did on or about the 19th day of September, 
1864, at or near Middle Bass Island, in the State of Ohio, without law- 
ful authority, and by force of arms, seize, capture, and sink the 
Steamboat Island Queen 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. T 

Specification 3. In this that John Y. Beall, a citizen of the in- 
surgent State of Virginia, was found acting as a spy at or near Kelly's 
Island, in the State of Ohio, on or about the 19th day of September, 
1864. 

Specification 4. In this that John Y. Beall, a citizen of the in- 
surgent State of Virginia, was found acting as a spy on or about the 
19th day of September, 1864, at or near Middle Bass Island, in the 
State of Ohio. 

Specification 5. In this that John Y. Beall, a citizen of the in- 
surgent State of Virginia, was found acting as a spy on or about the 
16th day of December, 1864, at or near Suspension Bridge in the 
State of NcAV York. 

Specification 6. In this that John Y. Beall, a citizen of the in- 
surgent State of Virginia, being without lawful authority, and for un- 
lawful purposes, in the State of New York, did in said State of New 
York undertake to carry on iiTegular and unlawful warfare as a guerrilla ; 
and in the execution of said undertaking, attempted to destroy the lives 
and property of the peaceable and unoffending inhabitants of said State, 
and of persons therein travelling, by throwing a train of cars and the 
passengers in said cars from the raikoad track, on the railroad be- 
tween Dunkirk and Buffalo, by placing obstructions across said track ; 
all this in said State of New York, and on or about the 15th day of 
December, 1864, at or near Buffalo. 



Charge ^d. Acting as a Spy. 

Specification 1. In this that John Y. Beall, a citizen of the insur- 
gent State of Virginia, was found acting as a spy in the State of Ohio, 
at or near Kelly's Island, on or about the 19th day of September, 
1864. 

Specification 2. In this that John Y. Beall, a citizen of the insur- 
gent State of Virginia, was found acting as a spy in the State of Ohio, 
on or about the 19th day of September, 1864, at or near Middle Bass 
Island. 

Specification 3. In this that John Y. Beall, a citizen of the insur- 
gent State of Virginia, was found acting as a spy in the State of New 
York, at or near Suspension Bridge, on or about the 16th day of Sep- 
tember, 1864. 

John A. Bolles, Major and A.D.C., 

Judge Advocate, 
New York, Vjth January^ 1865. 



8 TKIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

Headquarters Department of the East, ) 
New York City, January Wh, 1865. ) 

The above-named Beall will be brought for trial before the Military 
Commission of which Brig. Gen. F. H. Warren is President. 

John A. Dix, 

Major General. 

To these charges and specifications the accused pleaded not guilty, 
and thereupon the Judge Advocate called Walter O. Ashley, a wit- 
ness for the prosecution, who, being duly sworn, in presence of the ac- 
cused, testified as follows : — 

Question hy Judge Advocate. State your name, place of residence, 
and occupation? 

Answer. My name is Walter O. Ashley. I am clerk and part 
owner of the steamboat Philo Parsons ; residence. City of Detroit, 
State of Michigan. 

Q. Look at the accused ; have you ever seen him before ? 

A. I have. On the 19th day of September last I saw him the 
first time. 

Q. State the circumstances under which you saw him. State the 
transactions which brought you first into company with the accused, be- 
ginning on the 18th of September. 

A. On Sunday, the 18th of September, about six o'clock in the 
evening, I was on board the steamboat Philo Parsons., in the cabin 
alone, at the boat's dock in Detroit ; she being a boat sailing from De- 
troit to the City of Sandusky, touching regularly at the Canadian port 
of Amherstburgh, and occasionally at Sandwich. On the evening of 
Sunday, Mr. Bennett G. Burley came aboard the boat, and inquired for 
Ashley. I told him my name was Ashley. He then said he intended 
to go down as a passenger, in the morning, to Sandusky ; that three 
friends were going with him ; and he requested that the boat would 
stop at Sandwich, a small town on the Canada side of the river below 
Detroit, and take on those three friends as passengers. I remarked 
that it was not customary for the boat to stop at Sandwich. He then 
asked it as a personal favor that the boat would stop and take on his 
friends. I then agreed, providing he, Burley, would take the boat him- 
self at Detroit, and let me know for sure that his friends would be ready 
to come on board at Sandwich, that the boat would call for them. He 
then went away. The next morning, being Monday the 19th of Sep- 
tember, the boat left Detroit at eight o'clock in the morning, with freight 
and passengers. As the boat was swinging away from the dock, Bur- 
ley came to me and reminded me of my promise to stop the boat at 



TEIAIi OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 9 

Sandwich. At the time the boat left Detroit, Capt. S. F. Atwood was 
in command of her, but he stepped off at Middle Bass Island, where he 
resides. I told Capt. Atwood that the boat would have to stop at Sand- 
wich, and he stopped and took these three friends of Burley at Sand- 
wich. 

Q. Who were they ? 

A. The accused was one, and there were two others. 

Q. Coming on board, did they report their names ? 

A. They did not. I did not record the names ; it has been my 
custom sometimes to record passengers' names on long routes, but I did 
not on this. 

Q. What was the dress of the accused when he came on board, 
civil or military ? 

A. They were all dressed in citizens' clothes, the entire party ; 
they had no baggage ; they were very gentlemanly in their appear- 
ance ; they said they were taking a little pleasure trip — might stop 
perhaps at Kelly's Island ; did not know exactly where they would 
go ; paid their fare to Sandusky. The fare is the same to Kelly's 
Island as it is to Sandusky. The boat then proceeded to Maiden, 
Canada West, about fifteen miles further doAvn the river ; about twenty- 
five men came on board there at Maiden, and they all paid their fare 
also ; that port is the same as Amherstburgh ; all the baggage brought 
on board by the party was a very old trunk tied up with cord, a rope 
tied around it. It was taken in at the after gangway of the boat by 
two of the roughest looking subjects in the party ; most of the party 
were roughly dressed in citizens' dress. 

Q. If the contents of that trunk became afterwards known, state 
what they were. 

A. It afterwards became known, and it contained revolvers and 
hatchets. 

Q. Leaving Amherstburgh, where did you go ? 

A. The boat proceeded on its way to Sandusky. Every thing 
passed off quietly during the day. It was about half-past nine in the 
morning when we left Amherstburgh. Every thing passed off quietly 
until about four o'clock in the afternoon. The boat stopped at a num- 
ber of islands transacting business and taking on passengers. At four 
o'clock in the afternoon she had just left Kelly's Island. She was two 
miles from Kelly's Island. Kelly's Island is in the State of Ohio, six 
miles from the American shore on Lake Erie. In sailing from Kelly's 
Island to Sandusky we sail nearly south ; we were about two miles I 
should judge from Kelly's Island toward the American shore, and some 
four miles off the Ohio main shore. 

Q. State what then occurred. 



10 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

A. I was standing on the main deck of the boat ; Captain Atwood 
was ashore. 

Q. Who was in charge of the boat ? 

A. I was in charge of the business of the boat ; I am not a 
sailor ; the mate was sailing the boat ; he was sailing master in charge 
of the sailing of the boat, and I was in charge of the affairs of the boat. 
As I said before, I was standing on the main deck in front of the of- 
fice and the ladies' cabin ; the passengers at this time — there were about 
eighty, nearly half of whom were ladies — were in the upper cabin. Three 
men came up to me, drew revolvers and levelled them, and said if I 
offered any resistance they would shoot me. 

Q. Who were the men ? 

A. They were three of the party ; the accused was not one of 
those three, neither was Mr. Bm'ley at this time. Bennett G. 
Burley came from the forward part of the boat aft, followed by 
fifteen or twenty. Burley had a revolver in his hand and level- 
led it at me and said, " Get into that cabin," meaning the ladies' 
cabin, "or you are a dead man." The parties that followed him were 
not armed at this time. He commenced counting, " one, two, three," 
at the same time. He had not counted a great many, probably, before I 
was inside the door ; two men were stationed outside of the door. I 
stayed inside of the door, and they were stationed outside the door, for 
the purpose of keeping me in the cabin, I suppose. One stood one side 
of the door, and the other the other, with revolvers in their hands ; the 
party gathered around this old trunk I spoke of before ; the cords were 
cut, the lid taken off, and they armed themselves from that with revolv- 
ers and hatchets ; most of them had <two large revolvers, and a portion 
of them hatchets ; they then took forcible possession of the boat, and 
made prisoners of aU on board. I w^as kept in the cabin for about one 
hour. I could look out through the door on the main deck and see 
every thing that was going on. Bennett G. Burley had charge of this 
deck at the time. Burley with an axe Avhich he found on board smashed 
the baggage room door open — I don't know for what purpose — then 
went forward and smashed the saloon door ; he then went with the axe, 
smashed the trotting sulky to pieces, which was thrown overboard ; he 
then with the men under him commenced to throw the freight over- 
board, consisting of household goods, tobacco and iron ; the iron was 
thrown overboard first. I won't say that I saw the household goods 
thrown overboard ; the iron was thrown overboard, perhaps the house- 
hold goods were not ; about an hour I should judge after the capture of 
the boat, the accused, Capt. Beall, came to me and asked me if I was 
in charge of the ofiice. I told him I was. He then asked me if I was 
in charge of the boat's papers. I told him I was. He then said he 



TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 11 

was in charge of the party, and wanted the boat's papers, and I went 
into the office and gave him the papers, and he took them and carried 
them away. 

Q. At the time he asked you for the papers did he make any 
statement to you as to who or what he was, or what his purpose 
was? 

A. He did not say directly. I made a request that he would not 
destroy the steamboat. He did not say directly whether he should de- 
stroy the boat or should not. He said something to the effect that if I 
was a United States soldier, or United States officer, and had seized 
any of their vessels, or something to that effect — I won't say the exact 
words — that I would probably destroy the vessel. He did not say to 
me that he was a Confederate States officer — some of the others did 
say so ; said the party were Confederate States soldiers, and that the 
expedition was in charge of Confederate States officers. Directly after 
the capture of the boat she was headed down the lake ; not towards 
Sandusky ; directly off from her course for Sandusky. She ran down 
the lake for half an hour, I should judge, and then turned around and 
ran up the lake to Middle Bass Island for the purpose of wooding, and 
also for the purpose of putting the passengers ashore. 

Q. She ran to Middle Bass Island and there did wood, and there 
the passengers were put on shore ? 

A. Yes, sir. Middle Bass Island is in the State of Ohio, about 
ten miles from the shore. She had been lying there about fifteen min- 
utes when the steamboat Island Queen came alongside of the boat ; she 
is a steamboat that runs from Sandusky to these islands with freight 
and passengers both, making the round trip every day. She came 
alongside of the Philo Parsons and made fast alongside. The party 
that were then in charge of the Philo Parsons went aboard the Island 
Queen^ seized her, made prisoners of all on board, and brought them 
all on board of the Philo Parsons as prisoners ; part of them were put 
in the cabin of the Philo Parsons, and part of them were put into the 
hold. The passengers of both boats were afterwards all put ashore on 
Middle Bass Island. When the boat had been lying at this island I 
should judge about an hour — I was in my office, I was allowed to go 
there ; there were two ladies and a gentleman in the office — Captain 
Beall came to the door and said : " Ladies you will have to go ashore 
now, as Ave are agoing to use this boat." He gave the young man per- 
mission to go also. They started out and I followed them ; I went 
back for the purpose of picking up my books and papers ; Capt. Beall 
came back and Burley with him ; I stood at my desk with Capt. Beall 
at one side, and Mr. Burley on the other ; I asked if they were going 
to put me ashore ; they said they were going to allow me to go ashore ; 



12 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

I asked permission to take the boat's books ; Capt. Beall said I should 
not take them, that I should not take any thing belonging to the boat ; 
I then said I had some private promissory notes in an envelope and re- 
quested leave to take them ; Burley said : "Let me see them.'* I pro- 
duced them ; he looked at them, said he " could not collect them," and 
gave them to me. Capt. Beall then said: "We want your money." 
I opened the money drawer, in which there was very little money, per- 
haps eight or ten dollars ; they took that out. Burley then said : " You 
have more money ; let us have it." I put my hand into my vest pocket 
and took out a roll of bills of about $100, and laid it on the desk ; I 
then requested again that I might be allowed to take the books, but 
they refused to let me take them ; I was then put ashore. 

Q. If you saw what became of that roll of bills, state what was 
done with it. 

A. The roll of bills was taken between them ; Capt. Beall and 
Burley took the roll of bills, and also took the money out of the drawer ; 
they took it between them ; they both made a demand for the money ; 
Capt. Beall made the demand first, and Mr. Burley afterwards made 
the demand. 

Q. Which of the two took the roll of bills after you laid it on the 
desk? 

A. They took it between them ; I will not swear which one posi- 
tively, they took it between them ; they both made the demand ; they 
said, " Give us the money ;" I then went on shore. 

Q. After you went on shore state what you observed was done 
with either or both of the boats — the boats I understand both remained 
in the possession of the seizing party? 

A. Yes, sir. After I went on shore and had been on shore about 
half an hour, the boats were started in the direction of Sandusky ; they 
were alongside lashed together. It was a moonlight night, and when 
about two or three miles out I noticed the Island Queen drifting from 
the Philo Parsons ; it afterwards proved that she was scuttled ; she 
drifted about four miles, and drifted on to a reef and was afterwards 
raised ; she was nearly full of water when she was raised. 

Q. Are you able from your own inspection to state that she was, 
and how she was scuttled ? 

A. Not from my own observation, r 

Q. You state from your own observation that you saw her 
drifting ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How much else can you state from your own observation as to 
what became of her ? 

A. I can state that I saw her the next morning on my way to 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 13 

Sandusky, on what is called Chickenolee Reef ; there was nine feet of 
water on the reef; she drew about four feet of water, and she was sunk 
on the reef where the water was about nine feet deep. 

Q. How far was that from the point where you saw her drifting 
the evening before ? 

A. About five miles. 

Q. When and where did you next see the accused ? 

A. I next saw the accused in the city of New York after his 
arrest. 

Q. Have you stated all that passed between you and him on board 
the Philo Parsons on the 19th of September? 

A. I think I have stated every thing that would be of any account ; 
I saw him considerably. 

The Judge Advocate said he had no further questions to ask the 
witness. 

Cross-examination hy Accused. 

Q. How long were you clerk of the Philo Parsons f 

A. Two seasons ; it was my second season. 

Q. What was your occupation before that ? 

A. I have been clerk on steamboats about nine years ; clerk and 
part owner. 

Q. In what other boats 

A. The steamboat Dot, a steamboat that ran from Detroit to Port 
Huron, as a freight and passenger boat. 

Q. Have you had any other occupation at any other time previous 
to that? 

A. Previous to tlhat I was clerk in stores from the time I was 13 
or 14 until about the time I was 20. 

Q. Have you now stated all the occupations you have had at any 
time in your life ? 

A. Previous to my going into a store which I think was when I 
was about 14 — I might have been 15, 1 cannot tell exactly now — I was 
attending school ; I was also with my uncle assisting him as clerk in a 
Post-OfRce ; that is all, I think. 

, Q. Had you ever seen Burley or Beall before they came on board 
the Philo Parsons as you have stated ? 

A. I have no recollection of ever seeing them before, either of 
them ; I saw Burley the 18th of September and Beall the 19th ; I have 
no recollection of seeing either of them previous to that to know them. 

Q. When the twenty-five persons came on board at Sandwich, 
which of them was it that made the remark about the pleasure-trip ? 



j[4 TRIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 

A. The twenty-five did not come on board at Sandwich, and the 
remark was made about the pleasure-trip when the three came on at 
Sandwich ; Burley was the man who had something to say about that ; 
I had more acquaintance with Burley than any of the rest of them ; he 
was spokesman for the whole party ; the other three I don't remember ; 
Burley had something to say about the pleasure-trip the night before on 

Sunday. 

Q. Was Beall present at the time when Burley made the observation ? 

A. I cannot say whether he was or not ; I did not pay any parti- 
cular attention to Beall until after the capture of the boat ; I don't re- 
member that he was present. 

Q. Did Burley in any of these conversations with you state that 
he was a Confederate State officer ; what his rank was ? 

A. No, sir ; he said nothing on that subject at any time to me. 

Q. You said that some of them did say that they were in the Con- 
federate State service? 

A. Yes, sir. The two men that were guarding me directly after 
the capture of the boat that stood outside of the door ; I asked them 
what they intended to do, they said that they were Confederate State 
officers and soldiers, and that they intended to capture the United States 
steamer Michigan^ and release their friends on Johnson's Island ; and 
others said the same thing. 

Q. You say that Burley was the spokesman of the party. Did he 
give all the orders that were executed in regard to the boat by the per- 
sons with him ? 

A. I saw more of Burley for the first two hours after the capture 
of the boat than of the accused ; I did not see the accused for an hour 
or an hour and a half ; I had supposed that Burley was in charge of the 
whole party, and in fact I supposed he was until Captain Beall came to 
me and requested me to give him the papers ;,he then said he was in 
charge of them ; I supposed that Burley was in charge of the party up 
to that time. 

Q. Give as nearly as you can what was the language of Beall 
when he made the announcement to you that he was in charge of the 
party. 

A. He asked me if I was in charge of the office ; I told him I was ; 
he then asked if I was in charge of the boat's papers, and I told him I 
was ; he said, " I am in charge of this party, and I want the boat's 
papers." I went into the office and gave them to him ; I then said to 
him that I was part owner of the boat, and I hoped he would not de- 
stroy the boat. He said something to the effect that if I was a United 
States officer — I will give you the words as nearly as I can — ^that if I 
was a United States officer and had seized one of their vessels, that I 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 15 

would probably destroy it. He did not say that be should destroy the 
boat. 

Q. Was the language he used this : " If you were a United States 
officer and had seized one of our boats, you would probably destroy it?*' 

A. Yes, sir. " Our boats," that is the language. 

Q. Did he use any language to indicate what he meant by " our " ? 

A. No, sir, nothing but that. 

Q. Up to this time had any one stated in Beall's presence that this 
was a party of Confederates ? 

A. Not in my hearing ; as I said before I saw but very little of 
Captain Beall for an hour and a half or two hours after the capture of 
the boat. 

Q. You have stated that revolvers were presented at you. Did 
any person actually make an attempt upon your life ? 

A. There were no shots fired ; they were presented at me, and they 
said if I offered any resistance they would shoot me. 

Q. Did Beall at any time or in any way interfere with you person- 
ally, either to threaten your life or to save it ? 

A. At the time the money was taken from me they had revolvers 
with them. I won't say that the revolvers were pointed at me. 

Q. Are you sure that you saw Beall have a revolver at the time 
he was in the office when the money was delivered ? 

A. I am, sir. 

Q. Have you a sufficient recollection of the weapon to describe it ? 

A. I have not, any further than that it was a revolver ; it had the 
appearance of being a revolver. 

Q. Are you acquainted with the different kinds of revolvers, so as 
to identify it in any way ? 

A. No, sir, I could not identify that revolver. 

Q. Did Burley threaten to shoot you ? 

A. He did, sir. 

Q. For what? 

A. At the time of the capture of the boat, before they had made 
the general seizure of the boat, and made prisoners of all on board, he 
drew his revolver and told me to get into that cabin — meaning the 
ladies' cabin — or he would shoot me. 

Q. At no other time ? 

A. No, sir, I think not. 

Q. Did not Burley ask you for the key of the room where the bag- 
gage was kept, previous to smashing the door in ; and did you not re- 
fuse, and say yois had not the key? 

A. I have not thought any thing in regard to that ; just after I had 
stepped inside the door I heard some one, whether it was Burley or 



16 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

not I cannot say, call for the key. Burley said, ' I will make a key." 
He found an axe on board and smashed the door open ; some one called 
for the key ; I was not asked for the key ; I do remember now, I 
heard some one call for the key to the baggage-room, and I remember 
Burley taking an axe and smashing the door in. 

Q. Did Burley at any time threaten to shoot you because you did 
not deliver the key to him, or did not obey his orders, or comply with 
some request that he made ? 

A. The only time he threatened to shoot me was before the gen- 
eral seizure of the boat, as I stated ; I think that was the only time. 

Q. Did any person make such a threat to you other than Burley ? 

A. Three others that I spoke of in the first place, just previous to 
Burley making the threat. 

Q. Was Beall present on either of those occasions ? 

A. No, sir ; I did not see Beall for an hour or an hour and a half 
after the capture of the boat. 

Q. Did you see him before the trunk was opened? 

A. Not that I know of ; as I said before, I have no recollection of 
seeing him until the time he made the demand for the boat's papers. 

Q. Was there any occasion while Beall was in your presence that 
any person either threatened or made a movement, as if to shoot you, 
Beall interfering and preventing it ? 

A. I don't recollect of any thing of the kind. 

Q. Did any such circumstance as this happen, that you being ask- 
ed for the key, and either refusing or hesitating to give it up, a pistol was 
presented at you, and the threat made to shoot, and Beall remarked, 
" Don't kill him, I will make a key myself," or any thing of that character. 

A. I don't recollect of any thing of that kind. It is possible that 
I might have seen Captain Beall, the accused, before the time that I al- 
lude to that he took the boat's papers, but I have no recollection of see- 
ing him after the seizure of the boat, until that time. 

Q. You say he was in citizen's dress like the other two persons 
who came on board ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Had he a hat or cap on ? 

A. I won't swear positively. I don't pay very close attention to 
people's clothing. 

Q. Was there any thing peculiar about any part of his dress that 
you observed? 

A. No, sir, nothing peculiar. 

Q. Did you hear any conversation between Beall and Burley, or 
Beall and any other person, in which they spoke of their design ex- 
cept what you have already stated to the Court ? 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. lY 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Had the snjall sum of money which was in the drawer been 
collected from the passengers ? 

A. The whole of it had been collected from passengers, or in pay- 
ment of freight. 

Q. Was there any money collected from any person, as if they 
were passengers, after the party took possession of the boat? 

A. No, sir, not to my knowledge ; I collected none. 

Q. Can you now state what you have not answered specifically to 
the question put by the prosecution, which of these two persons it was 
that actually took into his hand the money that you produced? 

A. I can swear that Captain Beall took some of it. 

Q. As to the hundred doUars in the roll, I mean? 

A. They both of them made the demand, and I laid the money on 
the desk. 

Q. Who took it up? 

A. The money was taken between them ; I am not going to swear 
positively ; I took the money out of the drawer ; they both made the 
demand for the money. 

Q. When Captain Beall asked you for the papers, as you say, did 
he say any thing about wanting such papers as showed the nationality 
of the steamboat ? 

A. I think he did ; he asked for the boat's papers ; I asked liim if 
he wished the enrollment and license, he said he did ; something to show 
what kind of boat she was, or something to that effect ; that she was a 
United States vessel ; and I produced the enrollment and license, and I 
stood by in the office when he read them ; he read them in my presence, 
or a portion of them. 

Q. Did he state any reason why he wanted the papers? 

A. No further than he said he was in charge of the party and 
wished the papers. 

Q. When he asked you for the money, or when the money was de- 
manded, were you asked if you had any public money in your posses- 
sion, or money that belonged to the United States ? 

A. I don't recollect that those words were used at all. 
Q. Did any one of them designate the money asked for as money 
belonging to the boat ? 

A. Capt. Beall said in the first place : " We want your money ;" 
and Burley said : " You have more money, and let us have it." 

Q. Did either of them in any way designate or specify what 
money they were asking for, whether it was the money belonging to 
the boat, or all the money in your possession ? 

A. I think they did not designate. All the money I had, however, 
2 



18 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BE ALL. 

was the property of the boat, of myself and others interested in the 

boat. 

Q. Did either of them say any thing to the effect that they did not 
want any private money that belonged to you personally ? 

A. No sir, they did not, not to my knowledge ; the word private 
or personal I don't think was used ; they gave me my personal papers — 
some personal notes ; I did not claim any of the money as personal ; I 
I claimed the notes as personal, that was all I claimed as personal. 

Q. Did they take any papers except such as belonged to the boat ? 

A. No, Sir. I made a demand for these notes as my personal 
papers, and they gave them up. 

Q. When the Island Queen attached herself to the Philo Parsons, 
were there any soldiers on the Island Queen ? 

A. There were about tw^enty or twenty-five unarmed United States 
soldiers going to Toledo to be mustered out of the service ; they were 
in uniform. 

Q. What became of them ? 

A. They were taken as prisoners, with the rest of the passengers, 
and were put into the hold wath the rest of the passengers. 

Q. What was the last you saw of them ? 

A. I was in the office ; they w^ere put ashore before I w^as ; they 
were put ashore at Middle Bass Island, the place where I was put 
ashore. 

Q. Where did you see Mr. Beall when you saw him in New York 
as you state ? 

A. I saw him at the Police Station in the City of New York? 

Q. Who took you to see him? 

A. I was taken by Col. Ludlow. 

Q. Was he alone when you saw him ? 

A. No, sir ; there were about twenty-five or thirty in the room 
with him. 

Q. Had' he a hat or cap on then ? 

A. I don't think he had any thing on at that time ; I think not. 

Q. Were you asked to point him out ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Did you speak to him? 

A. I did not at that time. 

Q. Did he wear his hair and beard as he does now, when you saw 
him in New York ? 

A. The same as it is now ? yes sir. 

Q. How was it w hen you first saw him ? 

A. He had a moustache without whiskers. 

The Accused said he had no further questions to ask the witness. 



TKIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 19 

Examination hy the Commission, 

Q. State whether there was any military or naval mark or badge 
on the accused while he was on board the Philo Parsons. 

A. There was not ; they were dressed as citizens, in citizens' 
dress, and paid their fare as passengers, and were treated as passengers. 

Q. Did Burley and Beall divide the money in any way, which you 
took and laid in a roll of bills on the desk ? 

A. They were taking the money Avhen I left ; I laid it on the desk, 
and they were taking the money ; they both made the demand, and 
were both taking the money between them. I saw them taking the 
money betAveen them and dividing it. I don't know any thing about 
how much either one of them took ; there was an actual division of the 
money, and I saw it. 

He-examination 'by Judge Advocate. 

Q. At the time the boat was captured, how far was she from 
Johnson's Island? 

A. Johnson's Island is in Sandusky Bay, inside of the main 
shore. I should judge the boat was captured about six miles from 
Johnson's Island. 

Q. How far is Kelly's Island from Johnson's Island ? 

A. About eight miles. 

Q. How far is it from Middle Bass Island to Johnson's Island ? 

A. I should say thirteen or fourteen miles. 

Q. Have you ever seen the United States war steamer Michigan ? 

A. I have seen her, but I never have been on board of her. 

Q. Do you know where she was at the time of this affair ? 

A. She was lying off of Johnson's Island, I should say about a 
mile. I stated that I had never been on board the steamer Michigan. 
I was on board her six or seven years ago. I have not been since the 
war. 

Re-cross-examination hy Accused. 

Q. You said the soldiers on board the Island Queen were unarmed ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you know whether there were any arms on board of this 
vessel ? 

A. There were not ; not to my knowledge. 

Q. Did you examine to see whether there were or not ? 

A. I did not examine. 

Q. During any part of the time you were on board after the cap- 
ture of the Philo Parsons, was any flag displayed by this party ? 

A. Not while I was on board. 



20 TKIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

Q. Did not they display a flag afterwards to your knowledge ? 
A. Not to my recollection. 
' No further questions were asked ; his testimony being read to the 
witness, he affirmed the same. 



The Judge Advocate then called William Weston, a witness for 
the prosecution, who being duly sworn, in presence of the accused, tes- 
tified as follows : 

Examined hy Judge Advocate. 

Q. State your name, place of residence, and occupation. 

A. William Weston, Sandusky City, Ohio. I have been fire- 
man for the last five years. 

Q. Have you ever seen the accused, Capt. Beall, before? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. When for the first time, and where ? 

A. The first time I saw him was on board the Philo Parsons^ on 
the 19th of last September. 

Q. State what you saw him do, and what you heard him say. 

A. After the capture of the boat, and we got a little excited, he 
came forward, and told us what they were going to do with us, and the 
boat ; I was a passenger on board ; he said they were not going to hurt 
or harm any of us, and that they would land us as soon as they thought 
fit ; he also stated that he was an escaped rebel prisoner from Johnson's 
Island, and that they had taken the boat for the purpose of capturing 
the United States vessel Michigan ; he said they were going to liberate 
the prisoners on Johnson's Island, and were going to destroy the com- 
merce on the Lakes ; that is all I recollect he said. 

Q. Did you see what was done with any of the freight on board 
the PMlo Parsons after the boat was seized ? 

A. I did not see them do any thing Avith thj3 freight, only they 
threw out one of my boxes, that I got afterwards on the beach, that was 
pitched out ; that was after they landed us on the Island ; they pitched 
one of my boxes into the water. 

Q. Will you state whether Eeall, the accused, had any arms about 
him or not, while on board the Philo Parsons. 

A. I could not state ; I did not see. 

Q. How was he dressed ? 

A. He was dressed in citizens' clothes. 

Q. Do you remember whether he wore a cap or a hat ? 

A. He wore a kind of a low-sized hat ; a low-crowned hat. 

Q. Where did you next see him after you were landed ? 



TRIAX OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 21 

A. I did not see him after I was landed on the Island until I saw 
him here, at Fort Lafayette, when I was brought down to the fort to 
identify him. 

Q. Did you hear on board the Philo Parsons^ from himself or 
others, what was the name of the accused ; what they called him ? 

A. Captain Beall. 

Q. You heard him called Captain Beall ? 

A. I could not say whether he was the person or not ; I heard 
somebody called Captain Beall. 

Q. Can you state who appeared to be in command, or charge of 
the party who seized the Philo Parsons ? 

A. I could not state. 

The Judge Advocate said he had no further questions to ask the 
witness. 

Cross-examined hy the Accused. 

Q. When you were brought down to Fort Lafayette to point out 
Captain Beall, did you point out tliis man ? 

A. Yes, sir, when I saAV him. 

Q. Who was with him ? 

A. I could not state who was with him ; I am a stranger, I don't 
know any of the men around. 

Q. Didn't you point out another and a different man, who proved 
to be a man named Smedley ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. What was the first you saw of this person ; who told you he 
was a rebel prisoner ; where was he ? 

A. He came forward stating what they were going to do with us ; 
that was the first time I saw him. 

Q. Did you know then that the boat had been captured? 

A. Not until he spoke. 

Q. Who was he speaking to ? 

A. He was speaking to the passengers. 

Q. Were you a passenger on board ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you notice what kind of a cord or string he had round his 
hat? 

A. I could not state. 

Q. Was there any tassel oq it ? 

A. I could not say. 

Q. Was there any gold in it ? 

A. I don't know. 

Q. Did you notice what kind X)f buttons he had on his coat or vest? 



22 TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 

A. No, sir, I don't recollect. 

Q. Did the man who said he was a rebel prisoner, say that he was 
an officer in the Confederate army ? 

A. I don't recollect. 

Q. Where were you put ashore ? 

A. On Middle Bass Island. 

Q. Did these persons in possession show any flag at any time while 
they were aboard? 

A. I did not see any. 

Q. Have you ever seen a secession flag? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. "What kind of a box was this of yours that they threw over- 
board ? 

A. A large box containing bedding. 

Q. Who threw it overboard ? 

A. I could not state who threw it overboard, but I saw the man 
pitch it out. 

Q. Did either of them say any thing at the time as to why they 
threw it out ? 

A. No sir, they were out six or seven rods from the shore. 

The accused said he had no further questions to ask the witness. 

No questions were asked by the Commission. 

The testimony being read to him he affirmed the same. 



The Judge Advocate then called David H. Thomas, a witness for 
the prosecution, who, being duly sworn, testifies as foUows : 

Q. State your name, residence, and occupation. 

A. My name is David H. Thomas ; I reside at Niagara City, Nia- 
gara County, New York ; occupation, a police officer, by authority of 
said village. 

Q. You arrested the accused? 

A. I did, sir. 

Q. When and where ? 

A. In the depot of the New York Central Railroad Company at 
Niagara City, on the 16th day of December last, at about 9 or 10 o'clock 
at night. 

Q. Did you arrest any other person at the same time ? 

A. I did, sir, a young man caUing himself Anderson. 

Q. Were the two in company ? 

Q. They were. There was another police officer with me at the 
time of the arrest, Mr. Saule. 

Q. What baggage if any, had these men ? 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 



23 



A. They had a small carpet bag— contents, a dirty shirt, a shii't 
that had been worn, a pair of socks, some five or six taUow-candles 
that had not been burned, some matches done up in a paper, and a box 
partly full of paper collars. The accused had a bottle of laudanum in 
one of his pockets. 

Q. What was the dress of the accused? 

A. I should judge the same clothes that he has on now, with the 
addition of an overcoat atid cap. 
Q. He had on citizen's dress ? 

A. Yes, sir, all citizen's dress, with an overcoat and cap. 
Q. Had he any arms about him? 

A. He had one of Colt's navy revolvers in a sheath attached to 
his body by a belt under both his coats, outside of his pants on his hips. 
Q. Was the revolver loaded? 

A. Yes, sir, it was fully loaded — it was a six-shooter. 
Q. Did you inquire his name. 

A. I did, sir— while searching him I asked him his name, and he 
said Beall. A few minutes afterwards I asked him again, with a view 
of learning his initials ; he then said his name was W. W. Baker. I 
attempted "o correct him by stating that he formerly told me his name 
was Beall, and he denied it. I insisted upon it that he did say BeaU, 
md I told him I should make the record Beall or Baker— I should put 
his name down Beall or Baker. 

Q. If he had money, state what it was? 

A. He had two ten-doUar American gold pieces, two four-dollar 
Canada notes, one two-dollar Canada note, and he had some five or six 
dollars in American money or scrip, the exact amount I disremember. 
By scrip I mean fractional currency. I think he had some Uttle silver 
with him. I did not get the correct amount of the money. 

Q. Did he give you any account of himself at any time ? and if so, 

what did he say? 

A. When I arrested him he asked me what I arrested him lor.'' 
My reply to him was, that he knew probably as well as I did what I 
arrested him for. He said he, did not. I finally told him I arrested 
him as an escaped rebel prisoner. He asked from where. I told him 
that mattered not, as long as he was an escaped rebel prisoner. Finally 
he wanted to L-now from where. He asked if it was from Point Look- 
out I told him it was ; that he was an escaped prisoner from Point 
Lookout. Said he, " That I will acknowledge. I am an escaped 
prisoner from Point Lookout." 

Q. Did you make any inquiry of him how he got that Canada 

^^°Z ' I did, sir. His answer was, that after he escaped from Point 



24 TRIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 

Lookout lie made his way to Baltimore, and he had friends in Baltimore 
who had furnished him with this money to go to Canada. 

Q. In regard to the carpet-bag of which you have spoken, and the 
contents, what are the facts within your knowledge as stated by either 
of the two parties you arrested, that will enable the Court to judge to 
whom it belonged ? 

A. When we arrested the two men, this bag was between them on 
the seat, and carried, I think, by the prisoner Anderson into the room 
where we took them to search them. It was into the adjoining room, 
the telegraph office, that we took them to search them. We asked 
which of them owned that bag, and the young man said that the accused 
owned the bag. 

Q. The accused being present and hearing the remark: ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I asked him if the bag was his, and he said it was 
not. The accused said it was not ; but the other man said it was. 

Q. Did you make any inquiry as to the purpose of ihe candles or 
matches ? 

A. I asked them what they were doing with those candles. They 
said they were sometimes a necessary article to use when they could 
not get other lights. This young man, Anderson I think, answered in 
that way. I would not want to say which of them ; it was between them. 
They were both present. In regard to the laudanum, I asked the ac- 
cused what he was doing with that ; and his answer was, that he was 
subject to the toothache. 

Q. If the accused said any thing to you in regard to the mode of 
his arrest in connection with the fact of his being armed, state what he 
said. 

A. Yes, sir. During the ev ;ning or night, when we were convers- 
ing over the subject, he said it was fortunate that I arrested him sud- 
denly as I did ; that he had been in prison s© much that he had made 
up his mind, whenever he was attempted to be arrested again ; and on 
this particular occasion, had I not taken him as quick as I did, that one 
or the other of us would have been a dead man — that he had fully re- 
solved never to be taken alive. 

Cross-examined hi/ the Accused. 

Q. Was Beall alone when you arrested him ? 

A. No, sir ; they were together sitting on a settee, he and Ander- 
son, in the depot of the Central Railroad at that place. 

Q. Was it day or night ? 

A. Night, somewhere between 9 and 10 o'clock — about 10 o'clock. 

Q. Was any person with you ? 

A. Mr. Saule, another policeman. 



TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 25 

Q. Did he take any part in making the arrest ? 

A. He put his hand on Anderson, and I mine on Beall. 

Q. How large was this vial of laudanum that he had ? ' 

A. I believe what they call a two-ounce vial. 

Q. Was it full ? 

A. There was a very little out of it. 

Q. In this conversation that he had with you did he tell you any 
thing about his being a Confederate officer ? 

A. He said that he belonged to the Second Virginia Infantry, was 
a sergeant in the ranks. I asked him if he held any other position, 
and he said, No. 

Q. Did he tell you when he escaped from Point Lookout ? 

A. He did not give me the dates, but it was several days previous 
to his arrival at Buffalo. 

Q. What kind of a cap was he in ? 

A. It was a cloth cap — a citizen's cap. 

The accused said he had no further questions to ask the witness. 
No questions by the Commission. His testimony being read to the 
witness, he affirmed the same. 

The Commission then adjourned until to-morrow at 11 o'clock, a.m. 
John A. Bolles, Major and A.D.C., 

Judge Advocate, 



Fort Lafayette, New York Harbor, ) 
Thursday, February 2d, ]864. l 

The Commission met pursuant to adjourmneut. 

Present all the members. 

Present, also, the Judge Advocate, and the accused, John Y. Beall, 
who was brought in for trial ; and James T. Brady, Esq., his counsel. 

Yesterday's proceedings were read and approved. 

The Judge Advocate then called Edwaed Hats, a witness for the 
prosecution, who being duly sworn, in presence of the accused, testified as 
follows : 

Q. State your name and occupation. 

A. Edward Hays, doorman at the Police Headquarters, Mulberry 
Street. 

Q. You see the accused sitting here ; have you ever seen him be- 
fore ? and if so, where ? 

A. Yes, sir ; at the Police Headquarters in Mulberry Street. 

Q. State whether he ever said anything to you, and if so, what, in 
regard to his escape from Mulberry Street? 



26 TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEAI.L. 

A. He asked me to carry a letter out for him and have it mailed , 
I asked him where he wanted to send the letter to ; he said he wanted 
it to go to Canada ; I asked him if he could get it through easily there ; 
he said he did not think he could very easily, as the Government were 
opening all letters which were going there now ; he said he thought if 
he could get a letter to Canada, and word could be sent to his Govern- 
ment that he was in prison, they might do some good for him to get him 
out. I then went to get him the paper to write the letter ; at the same 
time I reported to Mr. Kelso, who was then in charge of the Detective 
Office, what he had told me, and I went back to the prisoner and told 
him that there were several detectives in the office at the time, that I 
could not very easily get the paper ; that I would wait for a start to get 
the office cleared of those detectives, and then I would have a better oppor- 
tunity of getting it in without being seen. He then said to me : " Hays, 
I tell you what you can do for me ;" I said, " What?*' he said, " You 
can let me go ;" I said I could not ; he said, " If you do I will give 
you $1,000 in gold." I asked him if he had that amount of money with 
him ; he said no, but if I would take his word, his word was good for 
the money when he would get to Canada ; that a man there had that 
amount of money and more belonging to him ; that it would surely be 
given as soon as he would get there. I asked him if he had any hand 
in the fires here in New York ; he said no, but that he knew the parties, 
and that they were then in Canada. I told him I did not think I could 
let him go for the money, as it would place me in a bad position ; that 
I did not like to do it ; that it would be too much risk for me to run. 
He said that I knew his position ; how he was placed ; that he thought 
he would be found guilty, and that I should run a little risk to save him. 
He said he was arrested before, some time ago, and that he got a letter 
through by some of his friends, and the Confederate Government hear- 
ing of his imprisonment here, put in prison a son of one of General 
Meade's head officers, together with eleven more officers, and kept them 
there until he was released. I then said to him, " I suppose if your 
Government found out that you were in prison here now that they 
would try to get you out in some way." He said he did not think they 
would, because he was arrested under a different charge now from 
what he was then, and that he did not think his Government was as 
strong now as it was then. I then told him I would see if I could 
let him go ; that I could not say whether I* could or not ; I asked 
him if he did not want to write a letter out, and he said no, that it 
would take too long before the letter could do any good, but that 
I could release him without getting myself into any trouble ; and 
said he, "You know you can." I then left him and came into the 
office ; I told him that I would see what I could do, and I reported to 



TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 27 

Mr. Kelso and Inspector Carpenter what he had told me. I again 
went back to him and told him that I thought it was pretty hard for me 
to do it, but if I did it what time in the night would he like to get away. 
He said he would like to get away in the fore part of the night ; that 
he had two friends living up, he thought, in Thirtieth Street ; that if he 
could get to their house, he wanted to get out in time so he could get 
there, so nobody would hear him make a noise around the place ; he 
thought he could get arms there, and then it would take somebody to 
arrest him if he could get arms after he got out ; for, said he, "I know 
well what would happen to me if I was to be caught and brought back 
again." I then asked him if those friends of his could not furnish him 
the money before he would leave New York. He said that very prob- 
ably they could furnish a part of it, probably half of it in greenbacks, 
if not in gold, before he would leave New York ; if not, that he would 
leave me an order that would positively get it in Canada. I asked him 
hov/ did he think he could get clear fi'om Ne^7 York, and if he had any 
friends that he thought would get him clear on the way going. He 
said first he would go to this man's house in Thirtieth Street, and then 
he would start for a friend of his in Jersey, about five miles from Jer- 
sey City, who did business in New York, who came every morning and 
went back at night, and by getting there he knew he would be safe. I 
then asked him if he would not tell me the number of the house where 
those men lived in Thirtieth Street, or what were their names, who 
were willing to assist him. He would not tell me their names ; said he 
did not know exactly the street they lived in, or the number of the house. 
I asked him what his own name was, or if he gave the right name in 
the detective's office when they brought him in. He said he did not ; 
that they did not know his name, and could not find it out. I then said 
to him : " I think you are a very smart man, and you must have done 
a good deal of harm to our Government since this war commenced ; " 
and he said : " Yes, I have taken hundreds and hundreds of prisoners ; 
I have done Lincoln's Government a good deal of harm, and they know 
it." I asked him if it was on land or sea that he took those prisoners, 
and he said that it was his secret. I asked him to tell me his right 
name, and he said he would not. He said he knew something that 
would be worth $30,000 to any one in the detective's office, if he would 
tell, and things that would be worth millions of dollars to the Govern- 
ment if he would only come out and discover, but he said he would die 
first ; he said he knew he could not live long, as he had got a ball through 
his side, and he knew that would come against him and cause death 
anyhow. I told him, " I am very glad you are not very fond of telling 
or discovering, for you would have to keep a good record if I let you 
go." He said he knew many things that he would not tell ; he said, 



28 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

"You can rest assured that you can get tlie $1,000, and get it in gold, 
as I own more than that myself." I then told him I would see what I 
could do, and if I could let him out that night I would, if possible, but 
I could not exactly say ; and that if not, I would come back and see him 
the foUomng evening ; and I then left him, and when I came back he 
was gone, and I have not seen him since ; he was taken to Fort Lafay- 
ette the next day. 

No further questions by Judge Advocate. 

The accused objected to the testimony of the witness in which he 
narrated the statement of the accused, as irrelevant, not relating to any 
charge or specification, but did not wish any ruling on the point. 

Cross-examined hy Accused. 

Q. How long have you been doorkeeper at the Police Headquar- 
ters? 

A. Since the 11th of April last. 

Q. What was your business before that? 

A. I worked in the Navy Yard at laboring work. 

Q. Where did you reside when you were appointed doorkeeper? 

A. At 17 Lewis Street, New York. 

Q. Wliat was youi' business, if any, before you worked in the 
Navy Yard? 

A. Liquor business, at 157 Madison Street. 

Q. About what was the date at which you first saw Beall, the ac- 
cused ? 

A. It must have been a week before New Year's, I think. I 
think it was New Year's Day that I was to come here and see him. It 
was the night before New Year's that this conversation occurred. I 
am not positive, but I think so. 

Q. Did all the conversation you have stated occur on the night 
before New Year's ? 

A. It all passed in one night. 

Q. In what part of the headquarters was BeaU confined at that 
time? 

A. Down stairs in the cell. 

Q. Who had charge of the ceU ? 

A. Mr. Kelso was then in charge of the office, in the absence of JMr. 
Young. 

Q. Who had the key of the cell ? 

A. The keys were generally left in ^he office. When I would be 
on duty as door-man, I would take the keys when I wanted to go into 
the cell for any thing, to feed them, etc. I am doorkeeper one day, 
and another man the next day. 



TRIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 29 

Q. How did you happen to begin this conversation with Beall? 

A. Mr. Kelso asked me if I could not find out what Beall's name 
was ; and if I could get him to tell his name, to try and find out what 
charges he was arrested on, and what was against him. 

Q. Where were the Police Commissioners at that time ? 

A. I don't know, sir, if they were not gone home from Headquar- 
ters. I don't know if they were up-stairs or not. 

Q. At what hour of the night was it that Kelso asked you to find 
out Beall's name ? 

A. I think it must have been about 7 o'clock. 

Q. Did Kelso say that he did not know what Beall was charged 
with? 

A. No, sir, he did not say any such thing. 

Q. Did he say that he did not know what his name was. 

A. He did not say so. 

Q. Did he speak of him as a person named Beall ? 

A. No, sir, not at that time. 

Q. I want you to repeat what Kelso said to you, when he ex- 
pressed a wish that you should see this man and ascertain his name ? 

A. Mr. Kelso said to me when I would get time to go into the 
cell to him, to see if I could not draw on with him to get him to tell 
me what his name was ; and if so, to see if I could not get from him to 
tell me what charges he was arrested on. That was all Mr. Kelso said 
to me. 

Q. How did Kelso describe or make you understand what person 
you were to ask this question of ? 

A. Baker ; he told me to go in and see Baker — which name he 
then went under ; I called him Baker always when he was there ; he 
went by the name of Baker ; he told me to go in and see Baker and 
see what I could learn from him. 

Q. Before Kelso spoke to you did you know that there was any 
such person as Baker confined in any cell there ? 

A. I knew that he was there and that he went by the name of 
Baker — that he was called Baker. 

Q. Who told you that he was called Baker ? 

A. I heard it from the detectives first when they first brought him 
in there. 

Q. Had you seen him before the time when Kelso asked you to go 
and inquire about his name ? 

A. Yes, sir ; several times. 

Q. Did Kelso tell you what object he had in finding out this man's 
name ? 

A. No, sir. 



30 TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 

Q. What was Kelso's position there at that time ? 

A. He was then acting as sergeant. 

Q. Did you say to him that if he wanted to know what this man's 
name was, or what he was charged with, he could ask the Commis- 
sioners ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Did you know who brought Baker in ? 

A. Not at that time. 

Q. Did Kelso state that he had asked the Commissioners what 
Baker was charged with, and that they would not tell him? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Then he gave no reason whatever for wishing to obtain this in- 
formation ? 

A. No, sir ; not that I know of. 

Q. Did you, at Mr. Kelso's request, go immediately to the cell 
where the accused was ? 

A. Not immediately — I waited some time until I had leisure ; I 
had a good deal of work to do. 

Q. Was it a part of your general instructions that you should or 
should not converse with prisoners there ? 

A. I never got any instructions to that effect as to whether to con- 
verse with them or not. 

Q. What time of night was it that you went to the accused and be- 
gan this conversation with him ? 

A. I should think it must be about eight o'clock — I think so, I'm 
not sure — between seven and nine. 

Q. Was that the first time you had ever spoken a word with him ? 

A. I had spoken to him previously to that while feeding him, and 
every thing of that kind. 

Q. Had you done any thing before that to get his confidence, or 
had he done any thing to get yours ? 

A. No, sir ; not that I know of. 

Q. Had you in any way before that night said or intimated to him 
' that you were willing to help him to escape ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Can you state any reason growing out of what had passed be- 
tween you and the accused why he should place any confidence in you 
particularly ? 

A. I did not know of any reason why he should have done it. 

Q. When you went at 8 o'clock to his cell to obtain for Mr. Kelso 
the information Kelso said he wanted, what was the first remark that 
you made to the accused that you now remember? 

A. There was a man in the cell that day, an old man, who wanted 



TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 31 

me to take a letter for him, and I would not take it ; he said he would 
pay for taking it ; I asked how much he would pay, and he said " so 
much" — I forget how much he did say ; I said I could not send it for 
that ; that evening when I went in at 8 o'clock in the cell, there was 
no one there at that time but the accused ; I said to this man, the accused : 
"It is pretty cold in here this evening;" he said "Yes, it was pretty 
cold ;" I said, " The old man had good luck to get out of there before 
night, as it was so cold ; " he said " Yes ; " I said he wanted me to send 
a letter for him, and I could not do it ; he would not give enough to 
have it sent, and I could not get anybody to take it for that amount; 
the accused said, " I wish you would take a letter for me and I will pay 
well for taking it ; " I told him, " There is a good deal done for money — 
money does a good deal ; " I then asked him where he wanted to have 
the letter sent ; that was how it commenced. 

Q. Had you any instructions whether to permit any letter to be 
sent by a prisoner without its being examined by any of the public offi- 
cers of the Government or City. 

A. Yes, sir ; I was instructed not to take a letter out for him with- 
out first showing it to the ofiicer in charge of the detectives' desk. 

Q. Did you know that the accused when first taken to the head- 
quarters of the police had been searched, and that he had no money 
about him or under his command at the time this conversation took 
place ? 

A. I don't know ; they did not tell me they searched him ; I know 
it is customary to search prisoners when they come here. 

Q. Up to the time when you returned the first time to his cell that 
night and said that you could not get the paper for him to write on, had. 
you said any thing to him about liis name ? 

A. I don't think I had. 

Q. Up to that time had you asked him what he was charged vnth. ? 

A. I don't think I had. 

Q. Did you during any part of this conversation ask him what he 
was charged with ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What did he say? 

A. He said that was his secret. 

Q. Do you mean to say that he stated that what he was charged 
with by our Government was his secret ? 

A. What he was charged with — the charge he was arrested on ? 
Yes, sir. 

Q, Did he state that as the reason why he could not tell you what 
he was charged with ? 

A. He did not state what was the reason ; he would not tell me. 



32 TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

Q. Did you tell Kelso that he had refused to tell you what he was 
charged with ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think so. 

Q. - Did you bring him paper to write on ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Did he write, or attempt to write any letter? 

A. No, sir ; not that night. 

Q. Did you pretend to him that if he wrote a letter you would 
have it sent for him to Canada ? 

A. I told him I would have it taken, and try and send it to 
Canada. 

Q. Did you intend to send it to Canada when you said so ? 

A. I first intended to give it to Kelso, who was in charge, to let 
him act on it as he saw fit. 

Q. Did Kelso during that night give you any instructions about 
the subjects about which you should talk to the accused? 

A. After I first came in and reported, he told me to try to find out 
the charges he was arrested on, and to get from him all I could. 

Q. Did you report to Kelso, from time to time that night, what 
the accused said? 

A. Yes, sir ; I reported. 

Q. Did Kelso suggest to you to get the accused to tell you he 
wanted to escape ? 

A. He told me no such thing. 

Q. Before the accused said to you, " You can let me go," what, 
if any thing, had you said or done to make him believe that you were 
his friend and would let him go ? 

A. Nothing that I could think of, more than I would see and have 
that letter forwarded as much as possible. 

Q. Do you mean to say that although he refused to tell what his 
name was, he wanted you to take his word for $1,000 in gold to let 
him escape ? 

A. He wanted me to take his word. Yes, sir ; he was to leave 
me an order for the money on that man in Canada. 

Q, Did you ask him whether he would sign his real name to that 
order ? 

A. No, I don't think I did. 

Q. Did you say to him that he could not expect you to take his 
word when he would not give his name ? 

A. I don't think I said so. 

Q. When you asked him about the fires in New York did you do 
that of your own suggestion, or because Kelso mentioned it ? 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 33 

A. No ; I thought I would find out if possible who the parties 
were, as I would like to know it at that time. 

Q. When he told you that he thought he would be found guilty, 
did he say what he would be found guilty of ? 

A. No, sir. 

Q. "When he told you that he had been arrested before, did he tell 
you where he was arrested or what he was arrested for ? 

A. He did not say. 

Q. Did he tell you the name of one of General Meade's head offi- 
cers whose son had been imprisoned by his Government ? 

A. He told me the name and I have forgotten it. 

Q. When he spoke of his two friends who resided in 30th Street, 
did he say in what part of the street they lived, or what their business 
was, or any thing of that kind? 

A. He said he did not know in what part of the street they lived 
in, or if they lived in 30th Street or not ; he said they did business down 
town in the lower part of the city. 

No further questions by the accused. 

No question was asked by the Commission. His testimony being 
read to the witness, he affirmed the same. 

The Judge Advocate then called George S. Anderson, who being 
duly sworn, in presence of the accused, testified as follows : 

Q. What are your name and age ? 

A. George S. Anderson ; I will be eighteen some day this month. 

Q. Have you been in the Confederate military service ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You saw and spoke to the accused as you came in ; when did 
you see him the last time before ? 

A. I saw him yesterday, and the last time I saw him before that 
was in prison in New York City. 

Q. When and where did you first see Captain Beall, the accused? 

A. I first saw him on the railroad out from Buffalo, several miles 
west towards Dunkirk ; I don't know what day it was ; it was five or 
six days before my arrest at Suspension Bridge. 

Q. Were you and the accused arrested at Suspension Bridge at 
the same time ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. State the circumstances which led to your seeing the accused 
on the railroad, and all that followed after you saw him in connection 
with your movements and his. 

The accused inquired if this testimony would relate to the sixth speci- 
fication of the first charge. The Judge Advocate answered that it would. 



34 TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

The accused objected to any proof in regard to that specification, on 
the ground that it related to a transaction which, if perpetrated as stated 
in the specification, would be an offence cognizable by the laws of the 
State of New York, and not within the jurisdiction of any military tri- 
bunal ; he consented that the objection be overruled for the present, but 
he wished to reserve the point. The question being repeated, the wit- 
ness answered as follows : 

A. I got to Buffalo on the Sunday preceding my arrest ; I got there 
an hour or two before daylight on Sunday morning ; I went into a hotel 
and got a room and went to bed ; I was in citizen's dress and had no 
arms ; in the morning, I suppose it was 8 o'clock when I got up, I 
went into the street and then came back to the hotel. 

Q. Did you meet any one at the hotel whom you had known in 
the rebel service? and if so, whom? 

A. I did ; I met Lieutenant Headley ; he belonged to Morgan's 
command when I knew him ; I saw him, but I did not speak to him, 
and he did not speak to me ; he got up and went out on the street, and 
I went out after him after a while ; he signified to me to follow him 
out ; I went out after him and he told me to follow him up stairs in the 
same hotel, which I did ; I also saw Colonel Martin there who had 
been an officer in the rebel service. 

Q. What passed between you and them? 

A. They said they were glad to see me ; they said they had a plan 
in view then, and they 'wanted more men, and they would like to have 
me with them. 

Q. What did they say about their plan, if any thing ? 

A. They said they intended to capture a train ; they told me to 
remain there that day ; that they were going to Dunkii'k the next day to 
capture the train from Dunkirk the next night after that. 

Q. Where did you get the pistol that was found upon you when 
you were arrested? 

A. Lieutenant Headley gave it to me. 

Q. On this Sunday or afterwards ? 

A. No, sir ; it was afterwards at Dunkirk. 

Q. Did they tell you where they had come from? 

A. No, sir ; they did not. 

Q. Whether from Canada c-e- any other place? 

A. I think they said they were from Canada. 

Q. What, if any thing, did they say to you in regard to their in- 
tended movements, after they had accomplished their plan ? 

A. They did not say any thing; they expected to go back to" 
Canada, but what they intended to do they did not say any thing 
■about. 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 35 

Q. Go on with your narrative of what was done. 

A. On Tuesday evening I went to Dunkirk, and tbey were to cap- 
ture the train that night coming from Dunkirk to Buffalo. 

Q. Who went to Dunkirk ? 

A. I went to Dunkirk, and these two officers went. 

Q. Anybody else that you know of? 

A. Not that I know of ; at Dunkirk they told me that they were 
not going to try to take the train that night ; they told me to be at the 
depot in Buffalo the next day at 2 o'clock ; that was Wednesday. I was 
there at the depot the next day at 2 o'clock, and I saw those two officers 
there, and they told me to follow them out along the railroad towards 
Dunkirk, which I did ; I followed them out I suppose three or four miles 
from the town, when we overtook Captain Beall, the accused, on the 
railroad. 

Q. State whether Beall became one of the party from that time in 
their movements. 

A. Yes, sir, he was one of the party. We went on the railroad to 
a point I suppose five or six miles from the city — we four ; we tried to 
get a rail off the track. 

Q. How did you try ? 

A. We tried with a large sledge-hammer and a cold chisel. 

Q. In whose possession did you first see that sledge-hammer ? 

A. I saw it in Capt. Beall's possession. 

Q. Who used it in trying to lift the rail from the track ? 

A. Colonel Martin. 

Q. Who else ? 

A. I don't think that anybody else used it. We tried to get a rail 
off the track and could not do it— did not succeed in the attempt, and 
went back to town. We then went to Canada that night, to Port 
Colburn. We remained there two nights and one day. We then came 
back to Buffalo. There was five in the party then. 

Q. The same four with one additional man ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Who was he? 

A. I don't know who he was. 

Q. Do you know what he was from his own statement or other- 
wise ; whether he was a soldier or officer in the rebel service ? 

A. He was a soldier. 

Q. How do you know ? 

A. All I know about it was, he told me he was an escaped prisoner 
from Rock Island. 

Q. You five came to Buffalo, and what waa then done? 



36 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

A. The Colonel told me to go with this Capt. Beall and stay with 
him, and he would meet us at a bridge with a sleigh — which I did. 

Q. Did Col. Martin meet you there ? 

A. Yes, sir, and Lieut. Headley was with him. 

Q. Where was the fifth man ? 

A. The fifth man went with Capt. Beall and me, and we parted. 
We missed the bridge — went the other side of the bridge, and we took 
one end of the road and came back to the bridge, and he took the other 
end of the road, and the sleigh had got by when we arrived there. But 
the sleigh found us at last. 

Q. And then there were five of you ? 

A. Yes, sir, five of us — the same five as before. 

Q. What did you do then ? 

A. We went to a point on the railroad I suppose five miles from 
the city. 

Q. And did what? 

A. We did not do any thing ; the train passed about the time that 
we got there. 

Q. What did you do that night and the next day ? 

A. We went back to Buffalo, and I and Capt. Beall and this fifth 
man stayed together at the hotel until the next day at 2 o'clock. 

Q. What did you do then? 

A. Then we met the Colonel and Lieut. Headley in a sleigh at the 
same bridge, the next day at 2 o'clock. 

Q. The same party of five, and the same sleigh? 

A. Yes, sir ; it was a two-horse sleigh. Then we went back to the 
same point on the railroad that we went to on the day before. 

Q. What did you do there ? 

A. Three of the party went up the track to get the sledge-hammer, 
I think, and I and the Colonel were in the sle»gh. We hitched the 
horses and got out, and went up the railroad a piece, and we saw the 
train coming, and the Colonel had taken up an iron rail and taken one 
end and laid it across the track. He got the rail by the side of the 
track. 

Q. How far had he got it on the track ? 

A. He laid it across the track. 

Q. Was it then light or dark ? 

A. It was then just about dark. 

Q. What happened, so far as you saw, to the train? 

A. I saw it strike the rail ; and the whistle blew just then, and it 
stopped, I suppose, some two or three hundred yards from there. I 
don't know what damage was done. 

Q. What did your party do, or what did the people in the cars do ? 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 37 

A. Somebody came back with a lantern — two or three came back. 
We went back to the sleigh and went to Buffalo. 
Q. What became of the sledge-hammer ? 
A. It was thrown away ; I don't think they got it. 
Q. What became of the cold chisel? 
A, It was thrown away. 
Q. What had the cold chisel been carried in ? 
A. It had been carried in the carpet-bag. 

Q. In the carpet-bag that was taken when you and the accused 
were arrested? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. In whose possession did you first see that carpet-bag? 
A. I saw in Lieut. Headley's possession. 

Q. How came it to be in your possession or Capt. Beall's at the 
time of your arrest ? 

A. It belonged to the party, I suppose. 

Q. Who brought it away from the place of the railroad collision 
with the rail? 

A. It was in the sleigh. 

Q. On getting back to Buffalo with the sleigh, what became of the 
party ? 

A. They determined to leave and go to Canada ; we took the cars 
for Suspension Bridge, 

Q. Who brought along the carpet-bag ? 
A. I think I had it most of the time. 
Q. By whose direction ? 
A. By the direction of the party. 

Q. On getting to Suspension Bridge on the train from Buffalo, what 
was done ? 

A. I and Captain Beall were arrested. 
Q. What became of the other three ? 
A. I don't know ; I never saw them after I left Buffalo. 
Q. You and Captain BeaU stopped at the depot, and were arrested 
there ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Did you hear the statement that Captain Beall made to the 
police officers who arrested you and him as to where he came from, and 
who he was ? State as near as you can recoUect all that was said and 
done at the time of your arrest. 

A. Captain Beall told the officer that we were from Point Look- 
out ; he said that we had escaped from Point Lookout, and were making 
our way to Canada. I have most forgotten what was said there at the 
time. 



38 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BE ALL. 

Q. What time in the evening was it that you were arrested ? 

A. We were arrested about 9 or 10 o'clock at night ; I and Captain 
Beall were in the depot seated near together. 

Q. How many officers were there who made the arrest ? 

A. There were but two officers, I think. 

Q. Were you and Captain Beall wide awake when they came in 
and made the arrest? 

A. I was asleep ; I don't know how he was. 

Q. What awoke you ? 

A. The officers awoke me ; they pulled me off my seat. 

Q. Where was the carpet-bag at that time ? 

A. It was on the bench that I was sitting on. 

Q. Between you and Captain Beall ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I think it was. 

Q. When Captain Beall stated that you were from Point Lookout, 
did you say any thing? and if so, what? 

A. I think that I assented to what he said, but I did not give any 
account of myself. 

Q. Did Colonel Martin, or Lieutenant Headley, or the accused, at 
any time in your presence state whether they were under orders, or 
were acting by anybody's directions ? 

A. No, sir ; I don't think they did. 

Q. What, if any thing, did they tell you they intended or expected 
to do or accomplish at any or all times when you were with them in or 
near Buffalo ? 

A. They did not tell me any thing except about the train. 

Q. What did they say about that ? 

A. The colonel told me that he expected to capture the express and 
the money that was on it. 

Q. Is that all you recollect ? 

A. That is all I recollect. 

No further questions by the Judge Advocate. 

Cross-examination hy Accused, 

Q. In what part of Virginia were you born ? 

A. I was born in Pittsylvania County. 

Q. How long have you known Captain Beall? 

A. The first time I ever saw him was on the railroad. 

Q. When did you first enter the service of the Confederate States ? 

A. I entered it last May, I think. 

Q. What corps were you in, and in whose command ? 

A. In Morgan's ; as a private in the cavalry. 



TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 39 

Q. When did you become acquainted with Col. Martin ? 

A. I got acquainted with him when I was with the command. 

Q. Was he a colonel in Morgan's corps ? 

A. He was with Morgan. 

Q. Did you attach yourself to Martin as courier or otherwise ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I was courier for the Colonel. 

Q. How long did you remain his courier ? 

A. I think it was a week or two. 

Q. Then what became of you ? 

A. I went back to my company. 

Q. At what place ? 

A. It was about three miles above Rogersville in Tennessee, I 
think, where I joined my company. 

Q. Had you ever seen Lieut. Headley before you joined him at 
Buffalo? 

A. Yes, sir ; he was with Colonel Martin. 

Q. You had seen him and knew him personally ? 

A. Yes, sir ; he was attached to my company about three weeks. 

Q. When you went into the hotel with Col. Martin, and it was 
said that there was a plan in view — who said that there was a plan in 
view? 

A. It was the Colonel ; I think both of them were speaking of it 
at the time, and spoke to me. 

Q. Did the Colonel introduce you to Headley ? 

A. No ; I was acquainted with Headley before. 

Q, Was any thing said about there beiag three or some other 
number of Confederate generals on the express train of the Lake Shore 
Road, and who were being removed from Johnson's Island to Fort 
Warren, Massachusetts? 

A. No, sir ; there was not. 

Q. Colonel Martin had command of this expedition ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And Headley and Capt. Beall acted under his orders ? 

A. Yes, sir ; all that I saw acted under his orders. 

Q. Was Capt. Beall present at the time when it was said what 
this plan was they had in view about the capture of the train ? 

A. No, sir ; he was not. 

Q. Was the accused present at any conversation between Headley 
and Martin, when you were also present ? 

A . I don't think that he was ; I don't think that we had any con- 
versation in his presence. 

Q. Had you ever seen Capt. Beall before the time that you over- 
took him on the railroad ? 



ttO TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

A. I never had ; not that I know of. 

Q. Who told you what his name was ? 

A. They told me that he was one of the party, and they gave me 
some name. 

Q. Who told you? 

A. Lieutenant Headley told me. 

Q. Did they tell you that he was an officer in the Confederate ser- 
vice, or about his rank, or any thing of that kind? 

A. I don't think they did. 

Q. Did they call him Captain, or how did they address him ? 

A. I have forgotten how they did address him. 

Q. Did Captain Beall give you any orders in regard to the attempt 
to get the rail off the track ? 

A. No, sir ; I don't think he did. 

Q. Who gave those orders ? 

A. Colonel Martin was the principal ; I think he gave the orders ; 
it all went by his directions. 

Q. When the train struck tlie rail which Colonel Martin had laid 
across the track, was your party concealed somewhere ? 

A. Yes, sir, we were in the woods ; I and the Colonel were in the 
woods ; the others, I think, were up the road apiece ; I don't know 
whether they were concealed or not. 

Q. Did you all come together again after the train struck ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Was that at the place where the sleigh had been left? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And went back to Buffalo ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Arriving there about what time ? 

A. Well, sir, we got there, I suppose, an hour after dark ; it was 
about dark when this thing happened, and we went on to Buffalo. 

Q. Did you go into the hotel together, or did you separate outside 
after you got back to Buffalo ? 

A. I don't recollect whether we went into any hotels or not. 

Q. You say the party determined to go to Canada ? 

A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What arrangement was made, if any, about your meeting in 
Canada, you five people ? 

A. There was not any arrangement made about meeting; they 
were all to go, I think, to Toronto. 

Q. Why did you not all go together ? 

A. There was nothing said, that I recollect, about the reason why 
we did not go together. 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 41 

Q. In going from Buffalo to Niagara you were all on the same train ? 

A. I suppose we were, but I don't recollect seeing them after we 
left Buffalo. 

Q. When you and BeaU were in the depot at Niagara, what were 
you waiting for ? 

A. We were waiting for the train — the eleven o'clock train that 
night ; I think it was the eleven o'clock train. 

Q. Was that the only reason why you were in the depot at that 
time — waiting for the train? 

A. Yes, sir, that is all the reason that I know of. 

The accused proposed no further questions. 

Examination hy the Co^nmission. 

Q. What do you mean by Express ? 

A. The Express and the money in it. 

Q. What do you understand to be the meaning ; that they were to 
take the Express train, or the Express in the train ? 

A. The Express that I understood was the Express safe. 

Q. What did the accused do at the time Col. Martin laid the rail 
across the track ? 

A. He did nothing ; there was nobody that did any thing except 
Colonel Martin. 

The Court proposed no further questions ; his testimony being read 
to the witness, he affirmed the same. 

The Judge Advocate then read in evidence the three letters of the 
accused, and acknowledged by him to be his, which were placed by him 
in the hands of Col. Burke : one addressed to Colonel Jacob Thompson, 
Toronto, Canada West, dated January 22, 1865 ; one addressed, by 
Flag of Truce, to Messrs. Hunter & Lucas, 173 Main Street, Rich- 
mond, Virginia, same date ; and the third addressed to Colonel A. R, 
Boteler, Richmond, Virginia, by a Flag of Truce, same date ; which 
three letters are hereto annexed, and marked Exliibits A, B, and C. 

The Judge Advocate also read in evidence a pocket diary, which the 
accused said was kept by him, and was in his own handwriting, and 
taken from him at Fort Lafayette, commencing Thursday, Dec. 29, 
1864. It is hereto annexed and marked Exhibit D. The Judge Advo- 
cate announced that the prosecution rested here. 

The accused being asked if he was ready to proceed with his 
defence, answered that he was not, and asked for an adjournment until 
next week. 

On jnotion of a member of the Commission the further hearing of the 
case was postponed until Tuesday, February 7, 1865, at 11 o'clock, a.m. 



42 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

The Commission then adjourned until to-morrow at 11 o'clock, A.M., 
to meet at Headquarters, New York City. 

John A. Bolles, Major and A.D.C., 

Judge Advocate, 

Fort Lafayette, N. Y. Harbor, ) 
Feb. 7, 1865, 11 o'clock, a.m. ) 

The Commission met according to adjournment. 

Present, all the members, the Judge Advocate, the accused, J. Y. 
Beall, and his counsel. 

The proceedings of the two last days of this trial were read and 
approved. 

The accused then introduced the papers hereto annexed, marked 
Exhibits E and F, purporting to be copies of the warrant of the appoint- 
ment of the accused as Master in the insurgent navy, and of a manifesto 
of the President of the so-called Confederate States ; and there the 
defence rested. 

By leave of the Commission, the counsel for the accused, James T. 
Brady, Esq., then delivered in behalf of the accused the address hereto 
annexed, and marked Exhibit Gr. 

Upon the conclusion of the address of the accused by his counsel, 
the Judge Advocate, in behalf of the prosecution, delivered the address 
hereto annexed, and marked Exhibit H. 

The Commission then adjourned to meet to-morrow, Feb. 8, 1865, 
at the Department Headquarters, New York City, at 12 o'clock noon. 

John A. Bolles, Major and A.D.C., 

Judge Advocate, 

Department Headquarters, New York City, ) 
Feb. 8, 1865, 12 o'clock noon. ) 

The Commission met pursuent to adjournment. Present all the 
members, and the Judge Advocate. 

The Commission was cleared for deliberation upon the case of the 
accused, John Y. Beall. 

Upon careful consideration of the evidence adduced, the Commission 
find the accused, John Y. Beall, as follows : 

Of Specification 1, Charge I., . , , Guilty. 

Guilty. 

. . . Guilty. 

Guilty. 

. Guilty. 

Guilty. 

. Guilty. 





2, 






3, 






4, 






5, 






6, 




Of CHARGE I, 





TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 43 

Of Specification 1, Charge II., . . . Guilty.- 

" " 2, " ... Guilty. 

" " 3, " . . . Not Guilty. 

on the day alleged in this specification : 

Of CHARGE II., Guilty. 

And the Commission do therefore sentence him, the said John Y. 
Beall, to be hanged by the neck until dead, at such time and place as 
the General in Command of the Department may direct, two-thirds of 
the members concurring therein. 

FiTZ Henry Warren, Brig.-Gen. U. S. Vols., 
President, 
John A. Bolles, Major and A.D.C., 
Judge- Advocate. 



One U. S. Stamp enclosed.] 



Exhibit A. 

Fort Lafayette, N. Y., Jan. 2U, 1865. 



Mr. D. B. Lucas, \ 

173 Main St., Richmond, Va. \ 

Dear Dan : — I have taken up board and lodging at this famous 
establishment. I was captured in Deer, last, and spent Xmas in the 
Metropolitan Hd. Qrs. Police Station. I am now being tried for 
irregular warfare, by a Military Commission, a species of court. 

The acts are said to have been committed on Lake Erie and the 
Canada frontier. You know that I am not a " guerrillero " or " spy." 
I desire you to get the necessary evidence that I am in the Confederate 
service, regularly, and forward it to me at once. I shall -write to Cols. 
Boteler and HoUiday in regard to this matter. I must have this evi- 
dence. As the Commission so far have acted fairly, I am confident of 
an acquittal. Has Will been exchanged ? I saw that Steadman had 
been killed in Kentucky. Alas ! how they fall ! Please let my family 
know if possible of my whereabouts. Where is my Georgia friend? 
Have you heard any thing from her since I left ? May God bless her. 
I should like so much to hear from her, from home. Will, and yourself. 
Be so kind, therefore, as to attend at once to this business for me. Re- 
member me to any and all of my friends that you may see. 
Send me some postage stamps for my correspondence. 
Hoping soon to hear from you, 

I remain your friend, 

J. Y. Beall, G, S. N. 
If Mr. Lucas is not in Richmond, will Mr. Hunter attend to this 

AT ONCE. 



44: TKIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

Exhibit B. 

[I enclose a U. S/Stamp.] 

Fort Lafayette, N. Y., Jan. 22d, 1865. 
Col. A. R. BOTELER, ( 

Riclimond, Va. ^ f 

Dear Sir : — I am on trial before a Military Commission for irregu- 
lar warfare, as a " guerriBero " and " spy." The acts are said to have 
been committed on Lake Erie and at Suspension Bridge, in Sept. and 
Dec. last. 

As I cannot in person procure any papers from Richd., I have to 
rely on my ftiends, and therefore I request you to procure evidence of 
my being regularly in service, and forward such evidence at once to 
me. I have also written to Messrs. Hunter and Lucas. Please call on 
them in regard to this, and also Mr. Henderson if necessary. 

Very truly, your friend, 

J. Y. Beall, G. S. K 

Exhibit C. 

Fort Lafayette, N. Y., Jan. 22d, 1865. 

Col. Jacob Thompson, ) 

Toronto, C. W. ) 

Sir : — I was captured in Deer., and am on trial before a Mititary 
Commission for irregular warfare, as a " guerrillero " and " spy." The 
acts are said to have been committed on Lake Erie and at Suspension 
Bridge, N. Y., in September and December last. 

I desire to procure from my Government and its authorities evidence 
of my being regularly in service, and of having been acting under and 
by authority. Please procure and forward me, as soon as possible, cer- 
tificates or other evidence confirming this fact. 

The Commission so far have evidenced a disposition to treat me 
fairly and equitably. With the evidence you can send, together with 
that I have a right to expect from Richd. and elsewhere, I am confident 
of an acquittal. 

Please attend at once to this, acknowledging at any Bate the receipt 
of this letter. 

Very respectfully, 

J. Y. Beall, 

Exhibit D. 

Thursday, Dec. 29, 1864. I purpose to keep in this little book a 
daily account of my imprisonment as far as I can. 
First. As to my incarceration : 



TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 45 

I was arrested Friday, December 16th, in the N. Y. Central R. R. 
station house, at the Suspension Bridge (junction with the Gr. Western 
R. R. of Canada). I was brought to this city Sunday evening (18th), 
and lodged here. I have been taken out some half a dozen times to 
be shown men, whose houses have been attempted by fire, or property 
otherwise attempted. The modus operandi is this : The prisoner, un- 
kept, roughly clad^ dirty, and bearing marks of confinement, is placed 
among well-dressed detectives, and the recognizer is shown in. As a mat- 
ter of course he can tell who is the stranger. My home is a cell about 8 
feet by 5, on the ground floor. The floor is stone ; the walls brick ; 
the door iron, the upper half grated, and opens into a passage running 
in front of three other cells ; this passage is lighted by two large win- 
dows doubly grated, and has an iron door ; at night it is lighted with 
gas. The landscape view from my door, through the window, is that 
of an area of some 30 feet square. By special arrangement I have a 
mattrass and blanket. There is a supply of water in my room, and a 
sink. My meals are brought three times a day, about 9, 3 and 7. My 
library consists of two New Testaments. I am trying to get "a Book 
of Common Prayer. The first week there were brought to this place 
10 persons, charged with criminal offences : men, women, and children. 
At first I took an interest in their cases, but now I do not ; they all 
have been guilty, I believe, and they all wished me a speedy riddance. 
Nearly every one I have met with seems to regard society as his 
enemy, and a just prey. They look on an offence simply a skirmish. 
Profane, lying and thieving, what a people ! Nearly all recommend 
me to take the oath of allegiance and enter the army and desert. But 
some are opposed to betraying comrades (" going back on 'em"), while 
others more liberal advocate any means as legitimate to save oneself 
from severe punishment. The Christmas of '64 I spent in a New York 
prison ! Had I, 4 years ago, stood in New York, and proclaimed my- 
self a citizen of Virginia, I would have been welcomed ; now I am im- 
mured because I am a Virginian tempora mutantur^ et cum illis muta- 
mus. As long as I am a citizen of Virginia, I shall cling to her destiny 
and maintain her laws as expressed by a majority of her citizens speak- 
ing through their authorized channel, if her voice be for war or peace. 
I shall go as she says. But I would not go for a minority carrying on 
war in opposition to the majority, as the innocent will suffer and not 
the guilty ; but I do not justify oppression in the majority. What 
misery have I seen during these four years, murder, lust, hate, rapine, 
devastation, war ! What hardships suffered, what privations endured ! 
May God grant that I may not see the like again ! Nay, that my coun- 
try may not ! Oh, far rather would I welcome Death, conie as he might ; 
far rather would I meet him than go through four more such years. I 



46 TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

can now understand why David would trust to his God, rather than to 
man. 

Since I have been placed in this cell I have read the Scripture, and 
have found such relief in its blessed words, especially where it speaks 
of God's love for man ; how He loved him, an enemy, a sinner, and sent 
His Son into the world to save His enemy; how He compels the 
wretched from the hedges and highways to come into the feast ; how 
any may come, and how He bids them, entreats them. Though it may 
seem unmanly to accept offers in our adversity which we neglected in 
prosperity, yet it is even so that with His assistance I will go up and 
beg forgiveness, and put my trust in the saving blood of Him who died 
for man. Aye, I pray Him to grant His grace to my mother and sis- 
ters and my loved one. If He is with them, who can be against? 

What pleasure I take in the hymns I learned in boyhood ! They 
come back to me now in my manhood and in my sorrow, and with 
God's blessing have wiled away and comforted many a weary and 
lagging hour. 

Dec. 30th. Last evening the doorman bought me a " Book of 
Common Prayer" for $1.00, and it was and will be a source of great 
comfort to me. I read over the familiar services and oft-heard hymns, 
and committed two — " Rock of Ages" and " Sinners turn, why will 
ye die?" — to memory. There were four accused in the three cells 
last night. As yet I have heard but one give good advice to another. 
They all with one accord exhort one another to be good soldiers in war- 
fare vs. society, not to give up stolen property ; and, above all, not to 
trust to the detectives, who are their natural and mortal enemies. 
Such is life ! ! ! 

Dec. 31st. The year is gone ; begun for me in ; it sees me, 

as it dies, a prisoner in New York. To-day I complete my twenty- 
ninth year. What have I done to make this world any wiser or bet- 
ter ? May God bless me in the future ; be it in time or eternity. May 
I be enabled to meet my trials with resignation, patience, and fortitude, 
as one who serves his country and home and people. The year went 
out in rain — drizzling rain. Will I see the year 1865 go out? or will 
I pass away from this world of sin, shame, and suffering ? 

Jan. 1st, 1865. Sunday, first day of the week and first day of a 
new year. To-day I enter my thirtieth year of pilgrimage. Accordiag 
to the calculation of my father's family, I am more than half-way 
down life's stream, even if spared by war and sudden death. But in 
prpng into the future, I can see nothing to induce me to think that my 
days will be lengthened to that age of fatality, fifty-six. Has my life 
been so crowded with pleasure or good deeds, that I need desire to pro- 
long it? Alas! no. Though well reared, and surrounded with very 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 47 

many advantages, I have not done any thing to give me particular 
pleasure ; nor, on the other hand, have I been remarkable for the oppo- 
site. I am truly thankful that I always stayed with mother and the girls 
and tried to do my duty by them ; that is one consolation at least, and 
also that I never voluntarily left them. They know not where I am 
to-day ; and every one of them is this day thinking of me. Little do 
they know where I am. Indeed, I doubt if they have heard any thing 
definite from me for many a weary month. Oh this war ! 

This far on life's way I have lived an honest life, defrauding no 
man. Those blows that I have struck have been against the society of 
a hostile nation ; not against the society of which I am a member by 
right, or vs. mankind generally. To-day the thought has obtruded 
itself again and again to become an " Ishmael." Your country is ruined, 
your hopes dashed — make the best bargain for yourself. " Remember 
the history of the civil wars of France, of England — the examples of 
Talleyrand, Josephine, &c. ; of Shaftesbury, Caermarthen, Marl- 
borough, &c." To-day my hands have no blood on them (unless of 
man in open battle) ; may I say so when I die. I saw grandfather and 
father die ; they both took great comfort from the thought that no one 
could say that they had of malice aforethought injured them. Better 
the sudden death, or all the loathsome corruption of a lingering life, with 
honor and a pure conscience, than a long life with all material comforts 
and the canker-worm of infelt and constant dwelling dishonor ; aye, a 
thousand times. God, our Creator, Preserver, and Saviour ! I pray 
give me strength to resist temptation, to drive back the thick-coming 
fancies brooded of sin and dishonor, and to cling to the faith of Jesus, 
who said, " Do unto others as you would that they should do unto you." 

Jan. 2d. Last night was called out, and a search made of my room 
and my person. The captures consisted of two knives. Poor Grimes ! 
your gift and keepsake was duly declared contraband and confiscated. 
They gave me two newspapers, which do seem to bear out the state- 
ments of Southern loss, &c. Savannah, indeed, is fallen ; but its gar- 
rison was saved, so that Hardee and Beauregard have an army. And 
Butler did not take Wilmington, though the fleet did storm long and 
heavy. Poor Bragg has some laurels at last. Oh that Gen. Lee had 
50,000 good fresh veteran reenforcements ! But what are these things 
to me here ! I do most earnestly wish that I was in Richmond. Oh for 
the wings to fly to the uttermost part of the earth ! 

What would I do without the Bible and Prayer-book, and the faith 
taught in them, best boon of God, the fount of every blessing ? That 
faith nothing can take away save God. 



48 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

Exhibit E. 

[copy.] 

Confederate States of America, Navy Department, i 
Richmond, March bth, 1863. ) 

Sir : — ^You are hereby informed that the President has appointed 
you an Acting Master in the Navy of the Confederate States. You are 
requested to signify your acceptance or non-acceptance of this appoint- 
ment ; and should you accept, you will sign before a magistrate the oath 
of office herewith, and forward the same, with your letter of accept- 
ance, to this Department. 

Registered No. . 

The lowest number takes rank. 

(Signed) S. P. Mallory, 

Secretary of the Navy. 
Acting Master John Y. Beall, of Va., C. S. N., 
Richmond, Va. 

[endorsed.] 

Confederate States of America, Navy Department, ) 
Richmond, 23<^ December, 1864. ^ 

I certify that the reverse of this page presents a true copy of the 
warrant granted to John Y. Beall, as an Acting Master in the Navy of 
the Confederate States, from the records of this Department. 

In testimony whereof I have herewith set my hand and affix the 
seal of this Department, on the day and year above written. 

(Signed) S. P. Mallory, 

Secretary of the Navy. 

Exhibit F. 

BY AUTHORITY. — CONFEDERATE STATES OP AMERICA. 

Whereas^ It has been made known to me that Bennett G. Burley, 
an Acting Master in the Navy of the Confederate States, is now under 
arrest in one of the British North American provinces, on an applica- 
tion made by the Government of the United States for the delivery to 
that Government of the said Bennett G. Burley, under the treaty 
known as the Extradition Treaty, now in force between the United 
States and Great Britain ; and whereas it has been represented to me 
that the said demand for the extradition of said Bennett G. Burley is 
based on the charge that the said Burley is a fugitive from justice, 
accused of having committed the crimes of robbery and piracy in the 
jurisdiction of the United States ; and whereas, it has further been 
made known to me that the accusations and charges made against the 
said Bennett G. Burley are based solely on the acts and conduct of 
said Burley, in an enterprise made or attempted in the month of 



TRIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 49 

September last (1864), for the capture of the steamer Michigan, an 
armed vessel of the United States, navigating the lakes on the 
boundary line between the United States and the said British North 
American Provinces, and for the release of numerous citizens of the 
Confederate States, held as prisoners of war by the United States at a 
certain island called Johnson's Island ; and whereas, the said enterprise 
or expedition for the capture of the said armed steamer Michigan, and 
for the release of the said prisoners on Johnson's Island, was a proper 
and legitimate belligerent operation, undertaken during the pending 
public war between the two Confederacies, known respectively as the 
Confederate States of America and the United States of America, 
which operation was ordered, directed, and sustained by the authority 
of the Government of the Confederate States, and confided to its com- 
missioned ofiicers for execution, among which officers is the said Ben- 
nett G. BURLEY ; 

Now, therefore, I, Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate 
States of America, do hereby declare and make known to all whom it 
may concern, that the expedition aforesaid, undertaken in the month 
of September last, for the capture of the armed steamer Michigan, a 
vessel of war of the United States, and for the release of the prisoners 
of war, citizens of the Confederate States of America, held captive by 
the United States of America at Johnson's Island, was a belligerent 
expedition ordered and undertaken under the authority of the Confed- 
erate States of America, against the United States of America, and 
that the Government of the Confederate States of America assumes the 
responsibility of answering for the acts and conduct of any of its 
officers engaged in said expedition, and especially of the said Bennett 
G. BtJKLEY, an Acting Master in the navy of the Confederate States. 

And I do further make known to all whom it may concern, that in 
the orders and instructions given to the officers engaged in said expedi- 
tion, they were specially directed and enjoined to " abstain from violat- 
ing any of the laws and regulations of the Canadian or British authori- 
ties in relation to neutrality," and that the combination necessary to 
effect the purpose of said expedition " must be made by Confederate 
soldiers and such assistance as they might (you may) draw from the 
enemy's country." 

In testimony whereof I have signed this manifesto, and directed the 
same to be sealed with the seal of the Department of State of the Con- 
federate States of America, and to be made public. 

Done at the city of Eichmond, on the 24th of day of December, 
1864. 

Jefferson Davis. 
By the ^President, 

J. P. Benjamin, Sec. of State, 
4 



50 TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. , 

Exhibit Gr. 

Address of James T. Brady ^ Esq., Counsel for the accused. 

Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Commission : Since I 
had the honor of appearing before this Court on the last day, there has 
been a publication in all our newspapers relating to the activity and 
success of a number of our detectives in ferreting out, as is supposed, 
the perpetrators of the attempt to fire the city of New York. That, 
of course, you gentlemen have all read, and being gentlemen of intelli- 
gence, reading it has made some impression on your mind. In ordinary 
cases an advocate seeking every advantage for an accused party, lays 
great stress on the fact that a person called a juror may have had his 
mind impressed by the publication of a statement affecting him, and it 
is, as you know, a reason frequently for setting a juror aside ; I have 
never, either as a lawyer or individual, attached much importance to 
that suggestion. I should be very sorry though, if any man claiming to 
be intelligent, should read any account of a transaction, and say it did 
not produce some kind of impression on his mind, and I only allude to 
it now for the purpose of saying that Captain Beall's name was mixed 
up in that, with a great many inaccuracies, and so far as there is any 
hint or suggestion there that he was either connected, or could be con- 
nected with that incendiary attempt, it is without foundation. He 
spurns any such suggestion ; and he has spent most of the time since I 
came into this room in vindicating himself from such an aspersion ; and 
he begs, that if the Court have any idea that he had the least concern 
in that transaction, he may be put upon his trial for that. He talks 
like a soldier and like a gentleman, and expresses the most unlimited 
confidence in the fairness and integrity of this Commission ; but he has 
the natural apprehension that every man would have in like position, 
that these out-door publications may insensibly affect the mind of some 
persons — though he feels from the profession, and the dignity and profes- 
sional honor of the Court, that he is hardly warranted in entertaining 
that idea, however remotely. I wish to assure him, and to say to the 
Court, that I have no such fears. And I can say to the Court, what 
they may have ascertained — what the Government can be informed 
of if necessary and proper, that Mr. Beall is of highly-respectable 
origin. His ancestors emigrated many years ago from the north 
of Ireland. He was a man of considerable property in the South, 
and he entered into the fight which is now going on from such mo- 
tives as had impelled men of high intelligence, and men who, how- 
ever delusively influenced to such an opinion, really think as sincerely 
as we believe in the sacred cause that we sustain, that they were 
acting from the most laudable motives. And while I presume that 
all the gentlemen in this room, like myself, feel that this battle should 



TRIAL OF JOHN T. [BEALL. 51 

never cease on our side until we have imposed again the authority and 
power of our Government over all the territory we ever possessed, 
and even feel, as I certainly do for one, that when that shall have been 
accomplished, the power of this Government should be felt in other 
directions, whenever the justification arises ; yet we would be false to our 
Maker if we supposed that all the men who fought on the other side 
were hypocrites and fanatics, or were impelled by such bad motives as 
impelled men to perpetrate crime. It would be inconsistent with my 
views of the majesty and justice of the Almighty that he should permit 
such men, led by such intellects, to act entirely from unreasonable and 
blind and wicked impulses. That we have justice on our side is un- 
doubtedly in our belief certain. But soldiers, whatever civilians may 
do, will never look at an enemy like the one we are contending against, 
as utterly bereft of reason, as utterly inferior to us, and not exactly level 
with the brutes. The accused has been, as the gentlemen of this Court 
have learned from his diary, I think, intelligently educated ; and whether 
it makes for him or against him, he has received sound moral culture. 
The mother and the sister to whom he so affectionately refers in that 
diary, have exercised over him — the mother first, and the sister after- 
wards — ^those ennobling influences which in the homestead exercise their 
great power over all of us in childliood and after life. And being a 
gentleman of education, a graduate of the University of Virginia, he has 
his own views about this case, and has communicated them to me, and 
I will present them to you. I have never had the pleasure of address- 
ing, except as a private citizen, any of the honorable members of this 
Court ; and my friend Major BoUes — ^I am sure he will permit me to 
call him so, as he has acted as such toward me — and myself have 
never been associated or opposed in any matter. And for that reason, 
at the risk of being considered, for the moment, egotistical, I wish to 
say to this Court, on the honor of a gentleman, that I never have sup- 
posed that Lord Brougham's definition of the duties or right of an advo- 
cate was correct. I have never entertained the idea that it proceeds, in 
the view of refined society, or in the view of any instructed conscience, 
further than this, that an advocate may fairly present honorably what- 
ever any man who is accused would have a right in truth to say for 
himself, and no more. With that view of the duty which I am attempt- 
ing to discharge on this occasion, I present in the first place the prison- 
er's proposition that this Court has no jurisdiction of the matters which 
are here being investigated ; that the trial of these offences should take 
place in a general court-martial, organized according to the well- 
established principles of the laws of war ; and that a Military Commis- 
sion, though it may exercise power over the citizens' of the Govern- 
ment which establishes it, cannot, according to the law of war and of 



Oii TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BE ALL. 

nations, take cognizance of the specific accusations presented here. I 
have never examined this question at all until this trial arose ; and I 
say to you, that the questions involved in this case, except so far as I 
have derived any knowledge from my general reading as a lawyer, 
are new to me. Some of them seem to be novel even in reference 
to the large experience of the Judge Advocate General, whose opin- 
ions are contained in the Digest of his decisions recently published. 

I find by looking through the history of jurisdiction, especially as to 
spies, that by an Act of Congress of 1808, it is in terms declared that a 
person charged as a spy shall be tried by a general court-martial. The 
Act of the 13th of February, 1862, contains the same provision ; but 
the Act of 1863 provides that persons embraced in the description of 
spies as there given, may be tried by a court-martial or military com- 
mission ; and of course it would seem that if it were within the power 
of Congress to make such a law, there is a specific warrant for trying 
this party before a military commission on the charge of being a spy. 
How much further it extends is a little questionable. But there is this 
peculiarity, to which I must call the attention of the Court. I refer to 
the Revised United States Army Regulations of 1863, page 541. In 
the Act of 1863 it is provided in the first Section, that so much of the 
law of July 17th, 1862, as requires the approval of the President "to 
carry into execution the sentence of a court-martial, be, and the same 
is hereby repealed, as far as relates to carrying into execution the sen- 
tence of any court-martial against any person convicted as a spy or 
deserter." 

You see, therefore, that unless there is something to modify this, a 
peculiarity arises from this legislation if a man be tried before a court- 
martial. 

[The Judge Advocate called the attention of the counsel for the ac- 
cused to the Act of July 2d, 1864, chapter 215, passed at the last ses- 
sion of Congress, which extends the provision to sentences of military 
commissions as well as court-martials on the trial of spies, guerrillas, 
&c. Mr. Brady resumed as follows :] 

I am very much obliged to you, and I am confident that something 
has occurred in legislation on that subject, or in the decisions. I be- 
lieve one of the decisions of the Judge Advocate General was to the 
effect that in equity, that provision would be extended to the cases of 
conviction before a military commission. But I had not in my library 
the Act of the last session ; and that being explained to me, I have said 
all that I wish to present on the subject of jurisdiction, and pass from 
that to another proposition, and that is, that Capt. Beall in these charges 
and specifications seems to be treated in two aspects : one as a mere 
individual, engaged in the perpetration of an offence against society at 



TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BE ALL. 53 

large ; and the other in the character of a military man, offending 
against the laws of war. If what is here presented against him in the 
proof shows that he has only committed some offence against general 
society cognizable in the ordinary courts of judicature, then he Avould 
be entitled under the Constitution of the United States to a trial by jury. 
That right accompanies him as a citizen of the United States, without 
any reference to what any revolting States may declare ; and whatever 
the South may say or think, we have not given up a single provision of 
our Constitution in regard to those matters, ahhough we have heard 
of, and the Government has acted on the idea of the suspension of the 
habeas corpus, and done other acts incident and proper to a state of 
war, so that some of the provisions of the Constitution have been to a 
certain extent interfered with. The Court of course perceives at once 
that I am correct in saying he is so treated. I will refer to this 
Digest of the opinions of the Judge Advocate General, at pages 79 and 
81. I read first the 11th paragraph : 

" Where a military commission was invested by the original order 
of the general convening it, ' with jurisdiction in all cases civil, crimi- 
nal, and in equity, usually triable in courts established by law' — ^held 
that such a tribunal was not authorized to be created, either by law or 
usage, and recommended that it be ordered by the Secretary of War to be 
dissolved." Very properly, because in that case it would seem, that in 
organizing the court the orders grasps all kinds of jurisdiction incident 
to the ordinary tribunals, and that was an assumption of power which 
the Government through its proper officers, very properly reprehended. 
I then read paragraph 16, which is as follows : 

" The murder of Union soldiers, for the disloyal and treasonable 
purpose of resisting the Government in its efforts to suppress the rebel- 
lion, is a military offence, quite other than the ordinary offence of mur- 
der, cognizable by the criminal courts ; and citizens who have been 
guilty thereof, though in a State where the courts are open, may be 
brought to trial before a military conomission. In such case, the cir- 
cumstances conferring jurisdiction should be indicated in the charge 
and distinctly set forth in the specification." That will commend itself 
to every member of this Court. It is quite possible that a man in the 
Confederate service, ordinarily engaged as a soldier by his Government 
— I shall use their phrase of course — might come within our lines and 
perpetrate a murder as an individual, in a way and under circumstances 
wholly divested of any relation with his military character, for private 
gain or personal revenge. The mere fact that he was a Confederate 
soldier, that he was within our lines, and that he murdered one of our 
citizens, would not render him amenable either to a court-martial or a 
military commission, if the circumstances indicated notliing giving it 



54 TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

the quality of a militaiy offence. That you very well understand. 
That is illustrated in this case of murder, where the Court and Judge 
Advocate must state the special circumstances which give to that mur- 
der of Union soldiers the quality and character bringing it within the 
jurisdiction of a military tribunal. 

Now, in the expedition of Lake Erie, with which the accused is 
connected, and the other attempt on the railroad, offences were com- 
mitted cognizable by the laws, in one case of Ohio and in the other 
of New York ; punishable by those laws. And if the evidence should 
establish that the persons engaged in either of those acts were acting 
irrespective of character as soldiers of the Confederate Government, then 
we respectfully submit that neither this Com-t nor a Court-martial would 
have authority to try the accused. If one of our soldiers should strag- 
gle and go into Richmond, or into any of the towns along the path of 
Sherman's army, and remain there and secrete himself and commit lar- 
ceny or burglary, he would not be amenable to any court-martial in the 
South for any such act, as we understand it. And we apply the same 
principle to the same act perpetrated in our lines by a Confederate soldier. 

In regard to the offence of the attempt to throw this railroad train 
off the track, wholly irrespective of the design avowed, according to 
the testimony of the witness Anderson, to take possession of the safe 
and money, we have a statute in New York, passed in 1838, which dis- 
tinctly makes it an offence to do any such thing in regard to railroad 
trains, and subjects the offender to five years' imprisonment in the State's 
Prison, or one year in the penitentiary, according to the judgment and 
discretion of the court. % 

The Act of March, 1863, section 30, provides this : " And he it 
further enacted. That in times of war, insurrection, or rebellion, mur- 
der, assault and battery with an intent to kill, manslaughter, mayhem, 
wounding by shooting or stabbing, with an intent to commit murder, 
robbery, arson, burglary, rape, assault and battery with an intent to 
commit rape and larceny, shall be punishable by the sentence of a gen- 
eral court-martial or military commission, when committed by persons 
who are in the military service of the United States, and subject to the 
articles of war." Congress deemed it necessary thus to provide for the 
authority of a court-martial to punish our own citizens when in the 
military service, for the crimes of murder, robbery, &c. 

But the accused and myself respectfully submit that the perpetration 
by a man who happens to be a Confederate soldier, within oiir terri- 
tory, of an offence, in the consummation of which he acts not in any 
military capacity or quality, is not an offence which a court-martial or 
military commission can take cognizance of. And if you look at this 
man who is here now, as here amongst us without a uniform, acting as 



TRIAL OF JOHN T. BE ALL. 55 

a mere aggressor against general society, the punishment of his of- 
fence belongs to the ordinary tribunals and not to this. I will consider 
that again in connection with the specific charge of his being a guerrilla, 
where it is supposed that the due authority for taking cognizance of this 
case will be found. I pass it for the present, having closed what I in- 
tended to say on the subject of the tribunal which should investigate 
this case, and the principles by which they should be governed. 

The accused also insists through the medium of his own reason and 
his reading and reflection, that the charge— particularly the first charge 
— " violating the laws of war," is too general and vague, and does not 
conform to the requirements of the law applicable to cases of this char- 
acter. 

When I was first consulted in this case, it was suggested that the 
objection to the generality of this charge should be made at the outset, 
and that is the usual course. But I said that so far as that objection 
was worthy of any consideration, the honorable members of this Court 
would consider it quite as much in their ultimate action as if the ob- 
jection was specifically made. And I must say to my client, with your 
permission, that usually the objection to any thing on account of its gen- 
eraUty is not of practical value, because if it be erroneous, it is only in- 
forming your adversary to make it more specific. It is of no advantage 
to the accused ; and I hope the accused, in this instance, will feel, as I do, 
that this Court has acted with the greatest possible courtesy— certainly to 
me and I think to the accused ; and the Judge Advocate has not done any 
thing in this case not eminently professional and honorable, and I am 
certain he will do nothing prejudicial to the accused except in such man- 
ner as becomes an ofiicer and a gentleman. I lay no stress, therefore, upon 
this objection as to the generality of the charge, because I don't see that 
there is any substance in it, except the one that naturally suggests itself 
to the accused that he might be tried again, and the charge, " Violation 
of the laws of war," would not show what specific offences were pre- 
sented against him. I leave this part of the case with just that remark, 
and come directly to what I understand to be the substance of the two 
accusations, without reference to the language of the specifications. 
, And we have ourselves met with the charge, in the first place, that he 
was a spy ; and, in the second place, a guerrUla. 

This charge of being a spy seems, from the language of these speci- 
fications and the tenor of the proof, intended to apply to him dm-mg aU 
the time that he was in the condition which, for the present, I shaU caU 
within our lines, though I presently may have to ask this Honorable 
Court to inform themselves what that phrase means, as apphed to the 
particular war now being waged between the two sections of our coun- 
try. What are Hues? Now, as to his being a spy, I may deceive my- 



•56 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

self, but I see no proof whatever to justify that accusation. And if, in 
what I am now about to say, I shall accidentally bring my mind in 
conflict with any settled opinions which you gentlemen of the profes- 
sion of war may have in your own minds, you will be good enough 
mentally to pardon me and wait until I get through with the demon- 
stration I attempt to offer. And not to appear pedantic, as any man may 
become, who looks through encyclopaedias and dictionaries, and gets the 
reputation of being learned without the merit ; for as the poet has said : 

'* Digested learning makes no student pale ; 
It takes the eel of science by the tail ; " 

let me come to the definition of the word spy. We know it comes 
from the French word espionner — to observe with the eye. 

That definition is certainly not broad enough, because a blind man 
might be a spy and a very good one. He may roam through the coun- 
try as a blind beggar, and through his ear receive intelligence to his 
side of the greatest service. 

And, if actual observation with the eye were necessary. Major 
Andre was not a spy, for he made no observation within our lines that 
could be of any possible service. He was not there for that object. 
He came there to meet Arnold, to get despatches with a view to 
deliver them to Sir Henry Clinton. He was convicted of being a spy 
because he was within the enemy's line to receive intelligence, and 
deliver it to the Commander-in-chief of his own army, that it might be 
used against the Colonies. 

That is a very clear case of being a spy ; just as clear as the case 
of Davis who was convicted the other day, a man who was carrying 
despatches from Canada to the South, and passing through our lines for 
the purpose of communicating that intelligence. And I cannot imagine 
how all this sympathy is wasted upon Andre, which I am sorry to say 
has found its way into the excellent work of Phillimore on International 
Law. It is true that Andre had on a uniform, but it was covered over 
with an outer coat. There was an actual concealment of the true 
character of the man, and he was travelling with a false pass, I may 
say, from Arnold ; and Arnold had the impudence to insist that Andre 
should be surrendered to Sir Henry Clinton, because he was travelling 
under this traitorous pass given by him. 

And Andre the less deserves our sympathy, because one letter of 
his addressed to Col. Sheldon is in existence, mentioned in Irving'sLife 
of Washington, showing that he intended to take advantage of a flag of 
truce for the purpose of holding his communications with Arnold. And 
if any thing on earth known among men, recognized by society, and 
sustained by humanity, is deserving of veneration, it is a flag of truce — 



TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 5T 

that DiYJne aspect of Heaven amidst the grim and bloody horrors of 
war. 

Now the definitions of the term sipy^ which I will take the hberty to 
mention so as to recall your memories to the nature of the word, are, 
first, from Webster. He gives three : 1st. " A person sent into an en- 
emy's camp to inspect their works, ascertain their strength and their in- 
tentions, to watch their movements, and secretly communicate intelli- 
gence to the proper ofiicer. By the laws of war among all civilized na- 
tions, a spy is subjected to capital punishment. 2d. A person deputed 
to watch the conduct of others. 3d. One who watches the conduct of 
others." 

Of course, the first is the only one important in reference to the word 
sjpy as used in these charges and specifications. Bouvier, in his Law 
Dictionary, says a spy is " one who goes into a place for the purpose of 
ascertaining the best way of doing an injury there. The term is mostly 
applied to an enemy who comes into the camp for the purpose of ascer- 
taining its situation in order to make an attack upon it." 

Bailey gives, I think, the best definition of sjpy that I have found 
anywhere ; but of its excellence, of course, you will be the judge. He 
vsays a spy is " one who clandestinely searches into the state of places 
and affairs."- 

Major General Halleck, in his most valuable treatise on Interna- 
tional Law and the Laws of War, at page 406, says this : " Spies are 
persons who, in disguise^ or under false ]^retences^ insinuate themselves 
among the enemy, in order to discover the state of his affairs, to pry 
into his designs, and then communicate to their employer the informa- 
tion thus obtained. * * * * The term spy is fre- 
quently applied to persons sent to reconnoitre an enemy's position, his 
forces, defences, &c., but not in disguise, or under false pretences. 
vSucfe, however, are not spies in the sense in which that term is used in 
military and international law, nor are persons so employed liable to 
any more rigorous treatment than ordinary prisoners of war. It is the 
disguise^ or falee pretence, which constitutes the perfidy, and forms the 
essential element of the crime, which, by the laws of war, is punish- 
able with an ignominious death." 

We see, therefore, that irrespective of the Acts of Congress, from 
the nature and signification of the word sj^y ; from the definitions which 
have been given to it by intelligent writers ; from what is said here by 
the General, who is certainly an excellent authority, there must, to con- 
stitute the crime of a spy, be something in the nature of a disguise, 
and the purpose of it to clandestinely obtain information to communi- 
cate it to the enemy. Now, let us see what Congress has said on the 
subject. I refer to page 502 of the Army Regulations, and this is 



58 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

somewhat interesting to me, whatever it may be to the Court — I mean 
the character of the legislation on this subject. In 1806, Congress 
provided : " That in time war all persons not citizens of, or owing alle- 
giance to, the United States of America, who shall be found lurking as 
spies in or about the fortifications or encampments of the armies of the 
United States, or any of them, shall suffer death, according to the law 
and usage of nations, by sentence of a General Court-Marshal." 

It related, you see, exclusively to persons not citizens of the United 
States, and did not owe it allegiance ; and no other persons, by the defi- 
nition of Congress, could be regarded as spies. So matters remained, 
for we had no occasion to legislate on the subject at all, until the act 
of 1862 was passed, which provides " that, in time of war or rebelHon 
against the supreme authority of the United States, all persons who 
shall be found lurking as spies or acting as such, in or about the forti- 
fications, encampments, posts, quarters, or headquarters of the armies 
of the United States, or any of them, within any part of the United 
States which has been or may be declared to be in a state of insurrection 
by proclamation of the President of the United States, shall suffer death 
by a general court-martial." 

That you will perceive is a provision made to reach the case of per- 
sons acting as spies in the South, or in such portions of the States, or in 
such States as were in rebellion ; and Congress seems to have consider- 
ed that special legislation was necessary for that object ; and that won't 
apply to the accused ; but, in 1863, the last legislation that I know of 
on this subject contains the provision : " And he it further enacted^ 
That all persons who, in time of war or of rebellion against the supreme 
authority of the United States, shall be found lurking, or acting as spies 
in or about any of the fortifications, posts, quarters, or encampments of 
any of the armies of the United States, or elseivhere, shall be triable by 
a general court-martial or military commission, and shall, upon con- 
viction, suffer death." 

All jpersons — there is no longer the distinction that they shall not be 
citizens or owe allegiance to the United States. The term is now large 
and comprehensive ; but they must be lurking or acting as spies in or 
about the fortifications, camps, &c. ; and I would respectfully submit to 
the Court that the words " or elsewhere" only mean elsewhere in refer- 
ence to something of the same character. They cannot mean any place 
in the wide world, because, according to that definition, if a man were out 
in the middle of the prairies on his way, or if he were in any State in the 
South, if he were near any fortification that we had there, or was away 
from any fortification, if he were lurking, it would reach him. Therefore 
it seems that so far as Congress has legislated upon this subject, they only 
treat as a spy a person who is lurking, acting specifically as a spy, in or 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 59 

near some place where the army is, with a view to detect its movements 
and inform the enemy ; and the question will be whether the prisoner 
stands in that category. Now, of course I heard when I was a boy, 
before I had ever looked at a law book, that there was a traditional 
idea, and it seems to have prevailed to this moment, that the mere fact 
of an enemy's being found within the lines of an adversary, without a 
uniform, constitutes the offence of being a sipy. TVe find that that is 
not strictly correct, or else it becomes correct by reason of his appear- 
ing without a uniform being equivalent to assuming o. disguise. 

Well, of course, it is just as much a disguise to take off a dress by 
which you are ordinarily characterized, as to put on one different from 
y^ur ordinary garb. That I concede, and it is very plain ; but in the 
case of the accused, there is no proof that he ever had a uniform, that 
he ever owned one or wore one ; and I suppose you, gentleman, know 
that, as a general thing, if not almost invariably, there is no such thing 
as a uniform in the South, and has not been for two or thi-ee years, ex- 
cept in the general resemblance that their clothes have ; and I believe 
you know that, in almost every case, if I am correctly informed, where 
an officer of the Confederate Government has been captured by our side, 
he has not had on any buttons or other insignia to denote his rank or 
condition. There may have been many cases to the contrary ; but if 
I am correctly informed. General Johnson, when captured by Hancock, 
had no uniform on. He had a round hat, and was very ordinarily 
attired. He was found in our lines, and in citizen's dress. Where he 
got that dress ; how long he had worn it ; whether he had had any other 
for the last five years, we know nothing about. But whatever may 
have been his dress at any time while within our territory, when will 
this Honourable Court say that the accused was within our lines, which 
is essential to constitute his being a spy? What are, in a military 
sense, the lines of the United States Army for the purpose of determin- 
ing the question of one's being a spy, or any other question ? Now, 
even if I felt so disposed, I have not the capacity to give this Honora- 
ble Court any information. That is a matter which military gentlemen 
understand perfectly, and they must determine for themselves. All of 
us who have been educated at all have some general idea of it ; but 
when we seek for definitions from the lexicographers, we derive very 
little assistance. I find Mr. Webster, in his dictionary, only gives one : 
"A trench or rampart ; an extended work in fortification," for which 
definition he cites Dryden. Now, I respectfully ask you, what are the 
lines of the United States Army, the being within which, in disguise, 
would constitute being a spy, if there were nothing to take that charac- 
ter away from the accused party? Do you mean all of the United 
States not in rebellion? Why any more or less than all the territory 



60 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

that the United States ever occupied or governed ? We have never con- 
sented to the idea that we have parted with one inch of that territory for 
any purpose. We claim that the United States exist now as they always 
did, and exist under the same Constitution as ever, for there is no other 
Constitution ; and whatever moral progress, whatever intellectual prog- 
ress, we may have made, however far we may have advanced toward 
any philanthropic or other result, we have had ho other Constitution, 
and we never can have, until we change it in the mode prescribed in the 
Constitution itself, and by which we have just taken a step toward the 
abolition of slavery. So that, in a general sense, if the United States now 
should get into a war with France or England, according to what seems 
to be claimed here in the case of Capt. Beall, the whole of our territory 
would be the lines of the United States Army. Is that so ? Or has this word 
lines a particular signification in military law and practice more restricted 
than that? If it have, you can say to one another what it is ; and when 
this Court shall have disposed of its duties in this case, if I have the 
pleasure of meeting one of you gentlemen, and there is nothing im- 
proper in it, I shall ask you to construct a definition which may be of 
service to me in the future. But I had supposed the word lines had 
some reference in general parlance to a camp. You may make a city 
a camp or an entire district, but I don't know that you can make a 
whole country a camp. I don't know whether Ceesar, Hannibal, or 
Alexander, in any of their extensive marches, could have established as 
their camps the whole country through which they went. I don't sup- 
pose that General Sherman could claim the whole of the State of 
Georgia as his camp. All this may be of very little consideration to 
you, because you know so much more about it than I ; but I respect- ^ 
fully submit that the word lines must mean some imaginary or prescribed 
territory relating to, and directly afiTected by the government of the army 
as such ; and in that sense I don't see how Beall was within our lines in 
a military sense, because he happened to be in the State of Ohio taking 
passage in a steamboat, or up at Niagara in the State of New York ; 
the State of New York never for one moment being subject to any kind 
of mihtary occupation. I don't see how the State of Ohio or the State 
of New York could be within our lines. But that proposition I submit 
to your intelligence and judgment. 

But suppose it should appear that the accused was in disguise, or 
without uniform, and within our lines ; what was he here for ? Was 
he here to lurk as a spy? Why, not at all. The evidence not only 
fails to show that, but it directly establishes that he was not. A man 
belonging to the Confederate service might come within our lines with- 
out his uniform, for a very lawful purpose. He might conie to perform 
an act of humanity ; he might come to see a friend or relation, not to 



TKIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 61 

speak one word on the subject of war. I think I may say I know the 
fact that officers of the armies on both sides who have had the acquaint- 
ance of ladies before this war have crossed the lines to visit them. 
And if you could to a certainty prove that a Confederate officer came 
vsdthin our lines, or they could prove that one of our officers went within 
their lines for a mere social purpose, it instantly divests him of the 
character of a spy. I will now refer you to the Digest of the opinions 
of the Judge Advocate General, page 127 : " That an officer or soldier 
of the rebel army coming within our lines disguised in the dress of a 
citizen, is prima facia evidence of his being a spy. The disguise so as- 
sumed strips him of all claim to be treated as a prisoner of war. But 
such evidence may be rebutted by proof that he had come within our 
lines to visit his family, and not for the purpose of obtaining information 
as a spy." And then this is stated : " The spy must be taken in flagrante 
delicto. If he is successful in making his escape, the crime, according 
to a weU-settled principle of law, does not fathom him, and, of course, 
if subsequently captured in battle, he cannot be tried for it. 

" Merely for a citizen to come secretly within our lines from the 
South, in violation of paragraph 86, of General Order 100, of 1863, does 
not constitute him a spy. A rebel soldier, cut off in Early's retreat from 
Maryland, and wandering about in disguise within our lines for more 
than a month, and seeking for an opportunity to join the rebel army, 
but not going outside our lines since first entering them : held not 
strictly chargeable as a spy." 

Now, on tliis subject we find that the accused did not come here 
as a spy, nor for any such purpose. He came on one occasion, if 
you believe the testimony in this case, to assist in a demonstration 
for the relief of the prisoners on Johnson's Island ; a specific pur- 
pose of war if he acted in a. military capacity. And in the other 
case, he was in the State of New York engaged in the capture of 
a railroad train, so as to get possession of the mails and money in 
the express safe ; and coming for either of those purposes, he did 
not come to lurk or make himself a spy in any way. And on that 
subject the Judge Advocate has been good enough to present the let- 
ters and diary of this young man to prove his declarations. Now, on 
the subject of declarations, the law is this, and it has always been the 
law : If I prove in reference to a man, in any proceeding, civil or 
criminal, his statements, they must always be taken together ; what 
exculpates you as well as that which proves you guilty. That is a rule 
of the soundest reason. If you should happen to shoot a man, and 
another person should arrest yoji, and should ask, " Who perpetrated 
this?" and you should say, " I killed that man, but I did it in self- 
defence," by no law of reason or justice could the first part of that 



62 TKIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

Statement be proved against you and the rest reserved. And more 
than that ; when you prove a man's statements or declarations, as they 
are called technically, they must be taken as true, unless they are in 
their nature incredible, or unless they are disproved by some other tes- 
timony. Now, we have here the letters written by this man, to which 
I shall refer — Avritten while he has been in custody ; and for what he 
writes, and states, and does, the accused holds himself responsible. 

[Mr. Brady read extracts from the three above-mentioned letters, 
which are in evidence, and from the diary of the accused, which is also 
in evidence, and proceeded as follows :] 

Now, bearing upon this question of whether he was one who in- 
tended to engage in the business of being a spy, I invite your attention 
to this diary, so impressively read by my friend the Judge Advocate, 
the other day, where the accused declares in regard to himself, that, 
although he has been imperfect — and which of us has not — that al- 
though his life has not been one unvarying progress of what is pure and 
good, he only reproaches himself as a Christian reproaches himself ; as 
any one of us reproaches himself in the silent watches of the night, 
when we are apt to suppose ourselves more completely in the presence 
of our Maker, and we are compelled to acknowledge the Aveakness, and 
imperfections, and folly which have disfigured our lives. It is only in 
this sense he has reproached himself. But he takes credit to himself, 
and thanks the Lord that he can say : "I never stained my hand with 
the blood of my fellow man, except in lawful battle ; and I cling to my 
mother and sister, and never left them voluntarily." I cite these things 
— fortunately in this case— as showing who it is you are trying, and as 
bearing upon the general probability of this young man, just thirty 
years of age, having forgotten the principles that he learned at the 
fireside, and by hereditary transmission from honored and honorable 
parents — the probability of his doing any thing except what he intend- 
ed to be, and regarded as honorable warfare, according to the civilized 
customs of mankind. And I can assure you that there is nothing in 
that man's nature which does not make it abhorrent to him, if I am a 
judge of human nature at all, to do any thing than what a misled 
Virginian would think was just and manly, on the side to which his 
conscience, conviction, education, and military attainments, led him. I 
think, therefore, that I am warranted in saying, that the charge of being 
a spy is not only not sustained, but entirely disproved. He did not 
come as a spy ; he did not lurk as a spy ; he sought no information ; he 
obtained none ; he communicated none. He was arrested at Niagara 
on his way to Canada, having, according to his declaration to Mr. 
Thomas, a witness of the Government, and whose statement the Gov- 
ernment must act upon, reached Baltimore after the failure of the ex- 



TKIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 63 

pedition on Lake Erie, been provided there with funds, and was mak- 
ing his way to Canada. He was just exactly in the condition of that 
soldier in Early's army who had been wandering about in our lines in 
disguise, waiting for an opportunity to return to the rebel force. And 
that is precisely what this man was engaged in doing, irrespective of 
the assault upon the railroad train to which I am about to refer. Under 
those circumstances he was not a spy — he was any thing and every 
thing but a spy. He was acting under a commission ; he was in the 
service of the rebel Government ; he was engaged in carrying on war- 
fare ; he was not endeavoring to perpetrate any offence against society. 
And if he were not acting under a commission or with authority, but 
was acting upon his own responsibility and from the wicked intent of 
his own heart for motives of personal malice or gain, he is not amena- 
ble to this tribunal, but must answer to the ordinary courts of the 
State within which the crime was committed. 

I now proceed to the second subject — the accusation that he was 
acting in violation of the law of war as a guerrilla. On that subject 
the Judge Advocate General says, at page 66 : 

" The charge of being a guerrilla may be deemed a mihtary offence 
per se like that of ' being a spy,' the character of the guerrilla having 
become, during the present rebellion, as well understood as that of a 
spy, and the charge being therefore such an one as could not possibly 
mislead the accused as to its nature or criminality if proved, or em- 
barrass him in making his plea or defence. The epithet ' guerrilla ' has, 
in fact, became so familiar, that, as in the case of the term ' spy,' its 
mere annunciation carries with it a legal definition of crime." _^. 

I have the pleasure of knowing the Judge Advocate General well. 
He is a very able lawyer, and perhaps not surpassed for genius and 
eloquence by any man alive — certainly in forensic efforts there is no 
man living who, in my judgment, is equal to him ; and those who have 
not heard him, have been deprived of what is a great intellectual treat.^. 
I can understand that his intelligence has exhausted that particular 
subject to which he refers, of the sufficiency of the charge against an 
accused that he is a guerrilla. But I do not find that he has given his 
opinion authoritatively on what is the real meaning of that term, nor to 
what kind of warfare it relates. I shall, therefore, look at other authori- 
ties in connection with that subject. Originally, we find from looking 
to history that an enemy w^as regarded as a criminal and an outlaw, 
who had forfeited all his rights, and whose life, liberty, and property 
were at the mercy of the conqueror. That was softened down from 
such rugged asperity by the advance of civilization and Christianity, 
but essentially the principle remains. The soldiers who surrounded 
Captain Beall on his way to this Court, and unknown to their superior 



64: TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 

officer, when the opportunity presents itself, murmur out in his hearing 
words that would denote that he was contemplated by them as a 
murderer, an outcast, and a villain, have not brought themselves to 
understand, to contemplate the dreadful fact, that war is nothing but 
legalized deception, and fraud, and murder. If I slay my fellow-being 
upon a provocation or insult, if he should assail the reputation of my 
mother, or offer insult to my sister in my presence, and in a moment of 
passion I slay him, by the law of the land I am guilty of murder, al- 
though the circumstances might recommend me to the clemency of the 
Court. And yet, if in obedience to the call of my country I go against 
the phalanx of men who have done me no personal wrong, do not I 
always gain my military triumph by the massacre of those innocent 
men ? If you march your battalions against the conscripted armies of 
the South, who suffer but the innocent ? while the guilty leaders — the 
wicked men who set this rebellion on foot, have thus far escaped, and seem 
destined to escape, whatever may be the issue of the war. Soldiers like 
you are not to be horrified by the fact that men engaged in a warfare, 
who treat you, and consider you to be their enemies, take possesion of 
your steamboats, or obstruct railroads, or endeavor to throw railroad 
trains off the track. It is very horrible to contemplate, when you look 
at it through the lens of ordinary society. A man who in times of 
peace lays obstacles upon the track for the purpose of throwing off a 
train in which there may be innocent women and children, not to speak 
of full-grown men, is regarded as a fiend. But has it not been a customary 
thing in this war, in all these expeditions called raids, for leaders to earn 
brilliant reputations by among other things tearing up rails, removing 
them, intercepting and stopping railroad cars, without reference to the 
question of who happened to be in them ? Would a general officer, or 
any one in command, who sought to interrupt the communication by rail 
between two of the enemy's posts, let a train pass through or stop it? 
If he seeks to stop it he must apply to it the means necessary to accom- 
plish it. Before the days of railroads, when soldiers were transported 
by means of animals attached to some kind of conveyance, did a Gen- 
eral engaged in warfare, who wanted to stop the soldiers, whether they 
were in stage-coaches (if soldiers ever travelled in that manner) or in 
caravans, ever stop to see how many innocent people would suffer by 
assailing them with weapons of destruction ? Certainly not. It is death, 
desolation, mutilation, and massacre, that you are permitted to accompHsh 
in war. And you look at it not through the medium of philanthropy, not 
through the Divine precept that tells you to love your neighbors as your- 
self, but through the melancholy necessity that characterizes the awful 
nature of war. You must change your whole intellect and moral nature 
to look at it as it is, the ultima ratio re gum — the last necessity of kings. 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 65 

This being so, legalized war justifying every method, every horrible 
resource of interrupting communication, where do you draw the line 
of distinction between the act of one you call a guerrilla and the act of 
one you call a raider, like Grierson ? Where do you make the distinc- 
tion between themarch of Major-General Sherman through the enemy's 
country, carrying ravage and desolation everywhere, destroying the 
most peaceable and lawful industry, mills and machinery, and every thing 
of that nature ; where do you draw the line between his march through 
Georgia and an expedition of twenty men acting under commission who 
get into any of the States we claim to be in the Union, and commit dep- 
redations there ? And what difference does it make if they act under 
commission, if they kill the innocent or the guilty ? There are no dis- 
tinctions of that kind in war. You kill your enemy ; you put him hors 
de combat in any way, with some few qualifications that civilization has 
introduced. You may say it is not allowed to use poisoned weapons, 
and yet we use Greek fire. You may not poison wells, but you may 
destroy your enemy's property. Even Cicero, in his oration against 
Verres, when the question arose whether the sacred things were to be 
preserved in warfare, said : " No, even sacred things become profane 
when they belong to an enemy." Now, I don't perceive that this term 
"guerrilla" has been interpreted so fully as one would seem to think 
from a hasty glance at the Judge Advocate General's opinion to which 
I have referred. At the outbreak of this war the Savannah privateers 
were captured ; they were held and tried as pirates. I was one of the 
counsel for the accused. The jury in the city of New York disagreed. 
In Philadelphia they convicted some of them ; and as the honorable 
members of this court remember, the Confederate Government proposed 
retaliation, and took an equal number of our men, their lot being de- 
termined by chance, and secured them, to be executed in case death 
were visited upon any of the privateers ; and one of the men who was 
so held was Major Coggswell, who has just left this room ; and for^the 
first time in my life I had an involuntary client, because the life of my 
friend Coggswell was dependent upon the result. Very soon, however, 
the Government set aside that idea and gave up the notion that priva 
teers were pirates. 

You remember the case of the " Caroline," which occurred in 1840, 
when the British Government sent its officers within our lines and took 
a steamboat from one of our citizens and set fire to it, and sent it over 
the Falls ; and you remember the diplomatic controversy that arose, in 
which it was claimed by England that the principle of respondeat 
superior must apply ; that it must be settled by the Government whose 
agents the perpetrators of that offence were. And although McLeod 
was tried in New York and escaped by the strange defence of proving 
5 



QQ TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

himself a liar — ^by proving that he would not have done the things that 
he boasted he had done, the idea has not yet been removed that it was 
something to be settled in the international relations of the two Govern- 
ments. 

We see that there may be transactions which do not seem at the first 
flush to belong to those of war ; and yet on a closer examination of them 
they prove to come within that description. I refer you to General 
Halleck's book, at page 306, and I beg your attention to this, as I know 
you will give it : 

" Partisans and guerrilla troops are bands of men self-organized and 
self-controlled, who carry on war against the public enemy, without 
being under the direct authority of the State. They have no commis- 
sions or enlistments, nor are they enrolled as any part of the military 
force of the State ; and the State is, therefore, only indirectly responsi- 
ble for their acts. * * * * If authorized and employed by the State, 
they become a portion of its troops, and the State is as much responsi- 
ble for their acts as for the acts of any other part of its army. They 
are no longer partisans and guerrillas in the proper sense of those 
terms, for they are no longer self-controlled, but carry on hostilities un- 
der the direction and authority of the State. * * * It will, however, 
readily be admitted, that the hostile acts of individuals, or of bands of 
men, without the authority or sanction of their own Government, are not 
legitimate acts of war, and, therefore, are punishable according to the 
nature or character of the offence committed." 

If that be so, you cannot convict any man as a guerrilla who holds 
a commission in the service of the Confederate government, and perpe- 
trates any act of war in that capacity. He is not self-organized with 
his command, nor self-controlled. He is acting under authority of our 
foe, and he is regarded as under so much protection as belongs to the 
law of war. If he has a commission, and do any thing which no man 
may do belonging to the army under any circumstances whatever, and 
commits offences which military courts have cognizance of, they will 
take jurisdiction and award the punishment he deserves. 

You will find that in this case Captain Beall was acting as an officer 
of the Confederate government, either in command himself of Confed- 
erate soldiers, or under the command of some Confederate officer, as in 
the attempt on the railroad where Colonel Martin of the Confederate 
service was in command. Commissioned officers of the Confederate 
government engaged in depredations for the purposes of war within our 
territory, are not guerrillas within this definition of General Halleck, or 
any definition recognized in any book that I have had occasion to refer 
to. So far as that definition and the like is concerned, that it is ratified 
by this Government, is shown from this proclamation of Jefferson 



TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 67 

Davis, referred to in specific terms, showing that it was done by 
authority of the Government. Now permit me, in this connection, 
to refer you, Mr. Judge Advocate, to Phillimore on International Law, 
3d volume, p. 137 : 

" If the unauthorized subject carry on war, or make captures, it 
may be an offence against the sovereignty of his own nation, but it is 
not a violation of international law. 

"The legal position that no subject can lawfully commit hostilities, 
or capture property of an enemy, when his sovereign has either ex- 
pressly or constructively prohibited it, is unquestionable. But it 
appears to be equally unquestionable, that the sovereign may retrac- 
tively ratify and validate the authorized act of his subject." He says 
on page 145 : " Guerrillas are bands of marauders, acting without the 
authority of the sovereign or the order of the military commander. A 
class which, of course, does not include volunteer corps, which have 
been permitted to attach themselves to the army, and which act under 
the commands of the general of the army." 

So that a guerrilla must be a marauder, self-controlled, not acting 
by the authorily of his Government, without a commission — a mere self- 
willed and self-moving depredator. The question is, whether there is 
any proof of any such character in regard to Capt. Beall. As to the 
transaction on Lake Erie, I accept all the proof which has been given 
by the Government. It was an expedition to take possession of that 
steamboat,. at a distance of some six miles from Johnson's Island, to 
run down the United States armed steamer Michigan, then lying at 
about the distance of a mile from Johnson's Island, and thus give the 
prisoners on Johnson's Island an opportunity to escape. 

[The Judge Advocate said there was no evidence to prove that the 
purpose was to run down the Michigan. ^ 

Mr, Brady resumed. Oh yes ! you have proved the declarations of 
the parties engaged in it on board the boat, by Mr. Ashley. Ashley 
states expressly that that was the purpose. 

[The Court said that the witness said the object was stated to be to 
capture the Michigan."] Mr. Brady again resumed. 

That was the purpose of the armed expedition of Confederate soldiers 
or officers, to take possession of, or capture the Michigan, and thus aid 
to release the prisoners on Johnson's Island. That I call a military 
expedition ; and that I call an expedition which being carried on by 
men under commission from the Confederate government, is legalized 
warfare and not the conduct of guerrillas. That, however, must be sub- 
mitted to your judgment. 

Now, what was undertaken at Niagara is proved here by no wit- 
ness except Anderson. What the accused said to Mr. Thomas, within 



68 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

the rule that I have abeady announced, that the whole must be taken 
together and all believed unless it conflicts with other proofs, has no 
relation to any such thing as this charge. When Capt. Beall was ar- 
rested by him, the Captain asked him for what he was arrested, and 
Thomas said in substance — I don't profess to give the very words — 
*' You know as well as I do." 

And then it was stated that he was arrested as an escaped rebel 
prisoner ; and Beall said, " From Point Lookout? " '' Yes." " Well," 
says he, " I confess that I am an escaped prisoner from Point Lookout." 

The records of this Government show, I presume, and therefore I am 
warranted in alluding to the fact, that Capt. Beall was a prisoner, and at 
Point Lookout, was taken by our forces and exchanged. In his conversa- 
tion with Thomas he was acting the part of human nature. He wanted 
to be released if possible. He got the officer to suggest that he was an 
escaped prisoner ; a thing involving no kind of turpitude or wrong, for 
every prisoner is entitled to escape, civil or criminal. It is the right of 
every man in society to escape the consequences of his actions ; it is 
the right of society to punish him. But what is the proof ? He did 
not say any thing to him except what I have already narrated. Now, 
who is Anderson ? He is an accomplice. And what is the law as to ac- 
complices ? They are competent w;itnesses. They are often employed from 
the necessity of public justice. Their testimony, as an old writer says, 
is tolerated rather than approved. The act of turning traitor to your 
associate involves what we have regarded from boyhood as the meanest 
kind of perfidy. And although upon his testimony alone you can con- 
vict a party, it is always stated, and it is stated by McArthur on Court- 
Martials, that he must be corroborated in something tending directly to 
implicate him. There is the only proof. Now, what was the object of 
the capture of the express train ? There is no person from the railroad 
to testify in regard to it. We don't know what happened to that train. 
Somebody went back with lights. We don't know whether any person 
was injured or not. Certainly according to Anderson's testimony there 
was no attempt made to take possession of any thing on board. I have 
not gone into any minutiae of the testimony ; it is not necessary. I 
shall not follow the wanderings of the statements made by Weston and 
Hays, who come from the station-house, or as to the details of what 
was in this carpet-bag, holding it to be entirely immaterial who owned 
it. Anderson said it belonged to the accused, and the accused said it 
did not. There were candles. They said they were serviceable when 
they could not get any other light. There was a bottle of laudanum in 
the pocket of the accused, which he said was for the toothache. Whether 
he had the toothache, or intended to poison himself, does not concern 
us. He had a right to poison himself, except as between Capt. BeaU 



TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 69 

and his Maker, or Capt. Beall and his Grovemment ; but it is wholly 
immaterial what that was for. And then as to the proof which my 
friend deemed it proper and necessary to give, to which I made no ob- 
jection, emanating from this Hays, as to what occurred in the station- 
house ; at the very worst, if Hays reported it accurately, it was an at- 
tempt to escape. What would either of you gentlemen do if you were 
captured by the enemy ? Get away if you could. I know I was very 
much rejoiced when my friend, General Franklin, made his escape so 
adi'oitly. And whether the accused did or not offer $1,000 to this 
man, whom he immediately took into his confidence without any reason 
for bestowing that confidence ; whether this man is correct in saying 
Capt. Beall, when he v/ould not tell him his name, asked him to take 
his w^ord for $1,000 ; all this does not bear upon this case. Now this 
escape, which in the law books is sometimes called flight, is sometimes 
given in evidence as a circumstance tending to fix crime. If a man 
should fall in the street, and should be discovered to be dead, and two 
or three others run away, and there are circumstances tending to prove 
that they murdered him, the fact that they run away is an item of evidence 
against them ; but only an item of evidence. But in warfare if a man 
is taken prisoner and afterwards escapes, his escape is sometimes the 
most poetical transaction in his life ; and his daring in getting away en- 
titles him to as much glory as courage on the battle-field. We read it 
in romance and poetry, and it stirs our hearts as much as any thing in 
the recca*d of battles. 

Therefore, I think, we have two distinct questions here, and only 
two: Is the accused proved to be a spy? And is he found to be a 
guerrilla ? What proof is there for the purpose of establishing these 
charges ? In the one case we say he was shown to be within our lines, 
if within our lines at all, not for the purpose of acting as a spy, but for 
other developed and proved objects inconsistent with his being a spy. 
In the other case it appears that he was not a guerrilla because he was 
a commissioned officer in the Confederate service, acting under authority 
of that government during war, in connection with other military men, 
for an act of war. If so, then he is not amenable to this jurisdiction. 
If I were before a tribunal who had not been accustomed to look at war 
with its grim visage, with the eye of educated intelligence, I should ap- 
prehend that the natural detestation of violence and bloodshed and 
wrong would pursue this man. But however wrong the South maybe — 
however dismal its records may remain in the contemplation of those 
who have the ideas of patriotism that reside in our minds — yet not 
one of you, gentlemen, would even be willing to acknowledge to any 
foreigner, hating our institutions, that you did not still cling to the South 
in this struggle, wrong and dreadful as it has been, and award them the 



70 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

attributes of intelligence and coui'age never before perhapa equalled, 
and certainly never surpassed, in the annals of the human race. 

Bad as their acts may be in our contemplation, have you any doubt 
that in the conscience of that man, in the judgement of his mother, in 
the lessons he received from his father, he has what we may think the 
misfortune of believing himself right ? 

That mother and those sisters who are watching the course of this 
trial with their hearts bleeding every instant to think of the condition 
of the son and brother, who would not care if he should be shot down 
in one hour in open battle, contending for the principles which they, like 
him, have approved ; if he were borne back to that mother like the 
Spartan son upon a shield, she would look at his corpse and feel that 
it was honored by the death he received. But shis would be humiliated 
to the last degree if she supposed that he had departed from the legiti- 
mate sphere of battle, and turned his eyes away from the teachings of 
civilization, and become a lawless depredator, and deserving and suffer- 
ing ignominious death. 

I leave his fate in your hands. I have endeavored to avoid any 
attempt to address to you any thing but what becomes the sober rt^ason 
of intelligent men. There are occasions when the advocate may at- 
tempt, if he possesses any endowment of that nature, what is commonly 
called eloquence, what is known as oratory. But I never consider that 
in a court like tliis any addi^ess of that nature is appropriate in any 
sense or degree. This is a thing to be reasoned upon. You will vievr 
it through the medium of reason with which the Almighty h^s endowed 
you. And I think I may say to my client, that whatever conclusions 
this Court reaches, it will be that of honorable and intelligent gentlemen, 
who would convict him, if at all, not because he is a southern officer, 
but because it is the imperious necessity of the law that they deem to 
be sufficient. 

Exhibit H. 

Address of the Judge Advocate, Major John A. Bolles A. D. G, 

Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Commission : It would 
be entirely improper, if it were at all possible, for me to imitate the ex- 
ample and follow the course of the eloquent counsel for the accused. 
lie has a right to be eloquent. He could not help being so even if it 
were wrongful. I have no such right. He is the advocate, I am the 
Judge Advocate. It is my pleasant duty to represent, not one side but 
both sides of the case ; absolute and entire justice ; the law as it is, 
and as it affects the case ; the facts as they are, and as they affect the 



TFT AT. OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 



71 



Govemmeiit and the accused. It is the duty of the advocate for the 
accused to seek for his acquittal. It is never the duty of the Judge 
Advocate to seek for the conviction of the accused ; but simply to take 
care that the facts and the law are spread before the Court and that 
strict justice be done. 

In order that justice may be done in this case, I shall, before pro- 
ceeding to the body of my address, ask the attention of the Court to 
one or two preliminary observations suggested by the remarks of the 
counsel for the accused. 

No reference has been made by the prosecution, and none will -be 
made, to any supposed connection of the accused with the November 
attempt to destroy the city of New York by fire, or with any other 
matter which is not described in the charges and specifications on which 
he is tried. The Court cannot, and would not, go beyond the case 
thus presented, and the evidence adduced by the prosecution. 

Allusion has been made in the argument, but I must remind the 
Court that there is no fact in evidence to warrant any allusion, to the 
wealth, family, ancestry, and university education of the accused. 
These are matters quite outside of the case, and have nothing to do 
with the real inquiry before this tribunal. 

Something was said of the accused, as appearing by government 
records, to have been at some time a prisoner of war at Point Lookout. 
But no such record is shown. The only evidence in the case that con- 
nects him with Point Lookout, is his false statement to policeman 
Thomas in December, that he had escaped a few days before from that 
place, in company with Anderson: whereas we prove him to have 
been at large in September, and to have been passing to and from 
Canada during the week of his arrest. 

It has been argued to you that the accused is honorable, devout, 
and of tender conscience ; and appeals are made to his diary for proofs. 
What shall we, what must we, think of his conscience who within a 
fortnight of that atrocious attempt upon the railroad, could devoutly 
thank God, as he does in that diary, that he has never committed any 
outcrying sin. 

You are asked to show some forbearance toward him on account 
of his hearty and conscientious belief that the cause in which he has 
been engaged, the rebel cause, is a righteous and just cause. But on 
page 11 of that diary, he states amongst his " consolations," that 
he never, of his own accord, left the home circle of his mother and 
sisters, — " I never voluntarily left them." Such is his real relation, 
involuntary, to the rebel service. I cannot regard him, therefore, as a 
firm believer in th e justice of the insurgent cause. 

Two papers have been put in evidence by the accused without objec- 



72 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

tion on my part : his letter of appomtment as master's mate m the rebel 
navy, and the " manifesto " of Mr. Davis in regard to Burley and the 
Lake Erie expedition. I was willing to admit that Beall was a rebel 
officer, and that all he did was authorized by Mr. Davis ; because, in 
my view of the case, all that was done by the accused, being in violation 
of the law of war, no commission, command, or manifesto could justify 
his acts. A soldier is bound to obey the* lawful commands of his supe- 
rior officer. Our 9th article of war punishes him for disobedience to 
such commands, but none other. His superior officer cannot require or 
compel any soldier to act as a spy, or as an assassin. If, then, such un- 
lawful command be given and obeyed, its only effect is to prove that 
l)oth he who gave and he who obeyed the command are criminals, and 
deserve to be gibbeted together. When did a spy ever seek to justify 
himself by pleading the command of his general? How can the mani- 
festo of the arch-rebel screen any of his subordinates who has trampled 
under foot that law of war — for war hath its laws no less than peace — 
which is binding upon all alike, from the rebel president to the rebel 
raider ? 

In this connection I will read some extracts from the opinions of the 
Chief Justice of the Canadian Court of Queen's Bench and of his associates, 
in the case of Burley, who was concerned, with the accused, in the seizure 
and plunder of the Lake Erie steamboats. The Chief Justice said : " But, 
conceding that there is evidence that the prisoner was an officer in the 
Confederate service, and that he had the sanction of those who employed 
him to endeavor to capture the Michigan^ and to release the prison- 
ers on Johnson's Island, the manifesto put forward as a shield to pro- 
tect the prisoner from personal responsibility does not extend to what he 
has actually done ; nay, more, it absolutely prohibits a violation of neu- 
tral territory or of any rights of neutrals. The prisoner, however, ac- 
cording to the testimony, was a leader in an expedition embarked sur- 
reptitiously from a neutral territory ; his followers, with their weapons, 
found him within that territory, and proceeded thence to prosecute their 
enterprise, whatever it was, into the territory of the United States. 
Thus assuming their intentions to have been what was professed, they 
deprived the expedition of the character of lawful hostility, and the 
very commencement of their enterprise was a violation of neutral 
territory and contrary to the letter and spirit of the manifesto pro- 
duced." 

In the same case Judge Haggerty observed, that " Had this prisoner 
been arrested on the wharf in Detroit, as he stepped on the Philo Parsons^ 
and avowed and proved his character of a Confederate officer, he would 
have been in imminent danger of the martial rule applicable to a dis- 
guised enemy. Had he been secretly joined there by twenty or thirty per- 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 73 

sons starting over from the neutral shores of Canada, and then by a sud- 
den assault destroyed some national property, or seized a vessel lying at 
the wharf and taken the money from the unarmed crew, I think they 
would, if captured in the act, have great difficulty in maintaining their 
right to be treated as prisoners of war, with no further responsibility. 

" In the Russian war, I think we should hardly have allowed such 
a mild character to a like number of Russians coming over stealthily 
from the friendly shores of Detroit to burn, slay, and plunder in 
Windsor. 

" All the prisoner's conduct, while within our jurisdiction during 
this affair, repels the idea of legitimate warfare. A British subject, 
without the Queen's license and against her proclamation, in the service 
of one of the belligerents, acting in concert vsdth persons leaving her 
ports on the false pretence of peaceful passengers, to wage war on a 
friendly power — no act of his raises any presumption in favor of his 
being in good faith a soldier or sailor waging war with his enemy." 

Mr. Justice Wilson made use of the following language : 

" The evidence returned to us shows, prima facie, that the prisoner 
committed a robbery in the State of Ohio, one of the United States. 
But it is answered, first, that the prisoner held a commission as Acting 
Master in the navy of the Confederate States. The holding of this or 
. any other commission, does not authorize him, mero motu, to wage warfare 
from a neutral territory on the unoffending and non-belligerent subjects of 
the country at war with the nation whose commission he holds. He says 
he seized the Pliilo Parsons as an act of war, with intent to liberate the 
prisoners on Johnson's Island ; but for this act he produces no order of 
any superior officer, and the evidence does not show that he had any 
such order. He says this robbery was at worst an excess of a belliger- 
ent right, which was merged in the principal act. Now, what was the 
principal act of war performed? Under the pretence of being a pas- 
senger, he went on board a freight and passenger steamboat at Detroit. 
As a favor, he requested the master to touch at Sandwich, a British 
port, to take in three persons as passengers, which was done. The 
boat proceeded on its regular voyage to Amherstburgh, a town in this 
Province, near the mouth of the Detroit River, about fourteen miles 
below Sandwich. Here about twenty men, dressed in the ordinary 
attire of the farming people of the United States, with one rough trunk, 
tied round with a cord, and no other baggage, supposed to be citizens 
of the United States returning to their homes after an absence to escape 
the draft for the recruiting of the army of the United States, came on 
board the steamer. The prisoner and his three feUow-passengers 
aflfect no knowledge of the last twenty. The course of the vessel to 
Sandusky, from the mouth of the river, is southeast. She had to pass 



74 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

a number of islands. The northerly are British, the southerly Ameri- 
can. The boundary line of this Province was north of the Bass 
Islands, and thence between Pele Island and Sandusky Island. John- 
son's Island is said to be fourteen miles from the Middle Bass Island, 
and two miles from Sandusky. Nothing occurred to excite suspicion, 
or cause alarm, until the boat was clearly within the territory of the 
United States. Suddenly, the prisoner presented a revolver at Ashley, 
and drove him, at peril of his life, into the ladies' cabin. Beall, one of 
his confederates, overcame the mate in a similar manner. The other 
twenty, more or less, rushed to their trunk, armed themselves with re- 
volvers and hatchets which it contained, acted under the orders of Beall 
'and the prisoner, and the boat became at once under their control. So 
far, neither of the leaders declares his reason for this proceeding. It 
was rumored that their object w^as to liberate the prisoners at Johnson's 
Island. After some hours, the boat landed at the Middle Bass Island, 
having taken possession of a small steamboat, the Island Queen. At 
this island, just before Ashley was put on shore, Beall and the prisoner, 
with revolvers to enforce the command, demanded his money. After 
getting what was in his drawer, the prisoner insists he has more, 
and Ashley took from his waistcoat pocket a roll of bills, about $90 
he supposes, which the prisoner and Beall share between them. 
These proceedings, so mean in their inception, and so ignoble in their 
development and termination, we are asked to consider as acts of war, 
and to accord to the prisoner belligerent rights. What is there in all 
this which constitutes the act of war ? If the object were to release 
the prisoners, from all that appears they never were nearer than four- 
teen miles to Johnson's Island. "Was the seizure of this unarmed boat 
jper se an act of war? for it has been argued that the robbery was 
merged in the higher act. The seizure of the boat, for whatever pur- 
pose, was one thing, the robbery of Ashley quite another, and in no 
way that we see, in furtherance of the design now insisted upon, neces- 
sary for its accomplishment. But is not the bona fides of the enterprise 
matter of defence which a jury ought to try. Such a trial can only be 
had where the offence was committed, and we cannot doubt but that 
justice will be fairly administered. 

" Then we are told that although the prisoner has no orders to show 
authorizing what he did, he has the manifesto of the President of the 
Confederate States, avowing the act and assuming it, and therefore he 
is not subject to this charge at all. We accord to that Confederacy the 
rights of a belligerent, as the United States has done from the day it 
treated the soldiers of the revolted States as prisoners of war ; but there 
is an obvious distinction between an order to do a belligerent act and 
the recognition and avowal of such an act after it has been done. The 



TRIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 75 

one is an act of war, the other an act of an established government. 
The one is consistent with what Great Britain acknowledges, the other 
is not. For as judicially to give effect to the avowal and adoption of 
this act would be to recognize the existence of the nationality of the 
Confederate States, which at present our Government refuses to ac- 
knowledge. 

" Giving for the moment this manifesto its full force, it distinctly 
disclaims all breaches of neutrahty ; but it is clear that this expedition 
took its departure and shipped its arms from our port. But does it as- 
sume the responsibility of this seizure and all that was done upon it 
throughout? If not, it is neither justification nor excuse. I see no au- 
thority for the doing of the act, and as an assumption of what was 
done, therefore, the whole justification fails. 

" The attitude of the United States towards us is no concern of ours. 
Sitting here, whatever they do, while peace exists and this treaty is in 
force, we are bound to give it effect. We can look with no favor on 
treachery and fraud, we cannot countenance warfare to be carried on 
except on the principles of modem civilization. We must not permit, 
with the sanction of law, our neutral rights to be invaded, our territory 
made the base of warlike operations, or the refuge from flagrant crimes. 
Peace is the rule, war the exception of modern times ; equivocal acts 
must be taken most strongly against those who, under pretence of war, 
commit them. For these reasons I think the prisoner must be remand- 
ed on the warrant of the learned Recorder." 

Mr. Davis' manifesto in terms forbids all violations of neutral rights, 
and proposes to ratify only " a proper and legitimate belligerent opera- 
tion," to wit, the capture of the United States^rmed steamer 3Iichigan, 
and the release of rebel prisoners at Johnston's Island. 

But whatever had been its language, the manifesto could not have 
justified any violation of the laws of war committed for the sake of ac- 
complishing " a proper and legitimate belligerent operation," such as 
robbing, stealing, and plundering in disguise ; and, as matter of fact, the 
acts of the accused had no reference to that " operation," not one parti- 
cle of proof is in the case that any design was formed, or effort made, 
by the plunderers of the Philo Parsons and Island Queen to effect that 
" operation." 

You have been asked to reject as unworthy of credit the testimony 
of George Anderson, in regard to the outrage near Buffalo, because he 
was an accomplice ; and it has been said that the laws regard such evi- 
dence with suspicion. There is no arbitrary rule of law on this sub- 
ject. According to Benet's Military Law, pp. 242, 243, you are at lib- 
erty to believe or disbelief the testimony of an accomplice according to 



76 TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

your own convictions ; and upon his testimony, with or without corrob- 
oration, you may convict the accused. 

The rule of law is equally reasonable in regard to the admissions 
of the accused, oral or written. If the prosecution puts in a part, it 
must put in the whole ; but when such evidence is actually before you— ^ 
so says Benet^ p. 264 — it rests with you to either believe or disbelieve 
either the whole or a part. If, then, you look at the letter of the ac- 
cused to Mr. Lucas, and find that it describes the accused as an ofiicer 
in the rebel navy, you may believe it ; and if you find it asserting " you 
know that I am not a guerrillero or a spy," you may believe, or disbelieve 
that the accused so thinks. But you will never commit the error of 
supposing that what he asserts on that point is any thing more than his 
opinion ; and upon the same facts which led the accused to that mis- 
taken opinion, you may be compelled by the law and the evidence to 
find him guilty. 

At this stage of the case, as well as at any time, I may answer the 
remarks of the learned counsel upon the legitimate scope and meaning 
of the phrase " within our lines." He has quoted an Act of Congress, 
which, as he thinks, and thinks correctly, punishes spies that are found 
in the insurgent States, and he has also referred to the later Act which 
punishes them wherever found; an Act into which the word "else- 
where " was introduced for the purpose of covering all possible cases ; 
and yet he is anxious to have your definition of the words " within our 
lines." Those words do not appear in this case in charge, specification, 
or evidence. But there can be no doubt of their meaning in the mili- 
tary mind. Every man is within our lines who enters a loyal State by 
sea or land, with hostile purposes. Any rebel emissary who has first 
violated the rights of Canadian neutrality, and then in the guise of a 
peaceful citizen crossed into our territory, along the whole northern 
frontier of which are military posts and garrisons, is within our lines ; 
and if he be a rebel officer or soldier, the law pronounces him to be a 
spy ; and unless he can prove that he is not, he will be hung as a spy just 
as certainly as he is caught and brought to trial. — Judge Advocate 
Holfs Digest, p. 127. 

" "Within our lines," means any spot within the loyal States where 
an enemy could do us a mischief, be it the Lake Shore Railroad, where 
the accused attempted his last enterprise, or the city of New York, in 
which the November incendiaries endeavored to destroy the commercial 
metropohs of the country, or Boston or Portland Harbor, into which 
rebel pirates or privateers might seek entrance, or a traitor spy might 
try to pilot them. There is no shore or border so remote that it is not 
now within our lines, and lines that" bristle everywhere with bayonets, 



TEIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 77 

and fro\Yii everywhere with forts and cannon. The phrase " within 
our lines " is as comprehensive as is the word " elsewhere " in the Act of 
Congress of March 3, 1863, sec. 38, as given on page 542 of the Re- 
vised Army Regulation, which provides that " All persons who in time 
of war or of rebellion against the supreme authority of the United 
States, shall be found lurking, or acting as spies, in or about any of the 
fortifications, posts, quarters, or encampments of any of the armies of 
the United States or elsewhere^ shall be triable by a general court-martial, 
or military commission, and shall, upon conviction, suffer death." 

The section thus quoted, I beg leave to say, shows that a spy, who- 
ever he may be, and wherever found within the broad limits of the 
United States, " lurking or acting," is amenable to a military commis- 
sion like the Court which I now have the honor to address, as well 
as to a court-martial ; and thus I furnish an answer to that question of 
jurisdiction which was raised by the accused, and which his counsel 
suggested in the beginning of his address as the first proposition of his 
client's, and not as his own. 

There can be no doubt upon this question of jurisdiction. It is true, 
as was decided by the Judge Advocate General on p. 79 of EoWs Digest^ 
cited by Mr. Brady, that a military commission cannot lawfully be 
clothed with power " in all cases civil and criminal, and in equity." 

But the same authority, on the same page, has decided that " many 
offences which in time of peace are civil ofiences, become in time of 
war military offences, and are to be tried by a military tribunal, even 
in places where civil tribunals exist." 

Major General Halleck, who is himself, as the counsel for the accused 
admits, of great authority in matters of public law, proclaimed the same 
doctrine in his celebrated Missouri Order, No. 1, quoted by Benet, 
p. 15. 

Will the Court permit me here to answer the claim set up by the 
accused to be tried by a jury for the crimes now charged against him in 
connection with the seizure of the steamboats and the attempt upon the 
train of cars? It is true that if these enormities had been committed in 
time of peace, or by ordinary citizens, rogues, and desperadoes, they 
would have been mere municipal or civil offences, and the perpetrators 
would be amenable to the civil courts and entitled to the trial by jury. 
But the accused is not prosecuted for a civil offence. He is, by the theory 
of this case, a military offender, a violator of the law of war. 

Mr. Brady himself admits, and quotes Holfs Digest, p. 79, par. 16, to 
show that murder, which is a civil offence under ordinary circumstances, 
may and does, in time of war, when committed for disloyal and treason- 
able purposes, become a military offence, and may then be tried by a 
military court, without the interposition of a jury. In time of war, the 



78 TKIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 

offender being a rebel officer in disguise, the question of intent, the quo 
animo, is very easily determined. In this case it is very clear that per- 
sonal advantage was not the motive that led to the seizure of the steam- 
boats, or the attempt on the railroad. To destroy the commerce of the 
lakes was one of the objects avowed by the raiding party on Lake Erie ; 
to inflict great injury upon great numbers of their Yankee enemies, and 
not the crazy expectation that a gang of five rebels could overcome and 
plunder a thousand passengers, was the purpose of the railroad attack. 

The acts charged and specified being military offences are triable by 
a military court, and the accused has no constitutional right to a jury 
trial. 

"The amendment of the Constitution," says the Judge Advocate 
General (Digest, p. 79, 80, sec. 18), " which gives the right of trial by 
jury to persons held to answer for capital or otherwise infamous crimes — 
except when arising in the land or naval forces — is often referred to as 
conclusive against the jurisdiction of military courts, over such offences 
when committed by citizens. But, though the letter of the article would 
give force to such an argmnent, yet in construing the different parts of 
the Constitution together, such a literal interpretation of the amend- 
ment must be held to give way before the necessity for an efficient exercise 
of the luar powers which is vested in Congress by that instrument." 

The Judge Advocate General further says : "A striking illustration 
of the recognition of this principleby the legislation of the country since 
an early period of our history is furnished by the 57th Article of War, 
in the fact that it has, from the beginning, rendered amenable to trial 
by court-martial for certain offences" (holding correspondence with or 
giving intelligence to the enemy), "not only military persons, but all 
persons whatsoever." 

I will add, that by the act of Congress of 1806 in regard to spies, 
the same jurisdiction of courts-martial was extended to that class of 
offenders, that they might suffer death " according to the law and usage 
of nations." 

If citizens may thus be subjected to trial by such courts, a fortiori, 
may enemies and armed rebels be deprived of the trial by jury. 

Pending a war like this, not less than in all ordinary wars, that 
branch of the law of nations of which Congress speaks in the act of 
1806, already quoted, as " the law and usage of nations " in regard to 
spies, ^. e., " the law of war ; " that law of war exists and takes effect 
everywhere within the territory of the belligerents, and everywhere by 
the instrumentality of military tribunals, and without a jury, punishes 
every offence against natural right and justice which is committed by 
soldiers or citizens, for disloyal and treasonable purposes. 

The accused, not his counsel, is of the opinion, as Mr. Brady informs 



TEIAL OF JOHK Y. BEALL. 79 

US, that the 1st charge does not set forth with sufficient particularity the 
offence alleged against him. By the well-settled rule of law, the charge 
is always thus brief and general. 

The Judge Advocate General {Digest^ p. 66) has decided that the 
charge of " being a guerriQa " is sufficient. It is in the specification 
which follows the charge, that the circumstances constituting the offence, 
and describing its perpetration, are to be fully and clearly set forth. 

DeHart^ p. 145. Benet^ p. 52. 

Neither the accused nor his counsel can complain that the specifica- 
tions under the 1st charge are not sufficiently explicit. 

I come now, Mr. President, to the inquiry, what are the true legal 
character and definition of the offences with which the accused stands 
charged? 

I. What is it, in law, to be a spy, and do the facts proved come 

up to the legal requirements ? 
II. What is it, in law, to carry on irregular warfare, and has the 
accused been found guilty of this ? 

I. The learned counsel for the accused is dissatisfied with every defi- 
nition of a spy that is comprehensive enough to cover the case on trial ; 
and is a little inconsistent in the matter. 

Bouvier, in his Law Dictionary, defines a spy to be " one luho goes 
into a place for the purpose of ascertaining the best way of doing an in- ' 
jury there" 

Why is not the counsel for the accused content with that ? 

The accused was an enemy, who came with hostile intent into both 
Ohio and New York, to ascertain the best way of injuring their peace- 
able and unsuspecting inhabitants. 

Bailey, in his dictionary, presents a definition which almost seems 
to satisfy the counsel for the accused. According to that venerable lexi- 
cographer a spy is one Avho " clandestinely searches into the state of 
places and affairs." 

The accused came aboard the Philo Parsons clandestinely, with the 
heart and hate of an enemy, but in the dress and with the profession 
of a friend ; so did he clandestinely enter the Island Queen ; so did he 
clandestinely visit Buffalo. Deception, disguise, concealment, falsehood, 
stamp their guilty image and superscription on all his acts, and on all 
his declarations. 

His dress belies and disguises his real character. If Andre in uni- 
form was rightly held to be in disguise because of his citizen's overcoat, 
is Beall not disguised when clad as a citizen throughout, from hat or cap 
to boots ? 

His story to officer Thomas was a tissue of falsehoods, for he de- 
nied his real name and assumed another ; he asserted that he was in 



80 TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

the rebel infantry, and not in any other branch of the service, when he 
was a naval, and was not a military officer ; his account of his recent 
escape with Anderson from Point Lookout, and all its details, was un- 
true. 

Do I say that his dress disguises his real character ? It did so at 
the time of his coming within our lines ; but now every disguise is a 
proof, an exposure, a demonstration, of his genuine character, because 
he is a spy. 

The counsel for the accused believes that Major Andre was a spy. 
He also believes that Davis, whose case I do not remember, was prop- 
erly held to be a spy. According to Mr. Brady's statement, Davis was 
a rebel officer who was on his way from Canada to the South, carrying 
despatches, and proceeding without delay through the intervening loyal 
States, holding communication with no one on his way. According to 
this admission the true definition of spy includes a class of men who 
come within the limits of the loyal States from a neutral and friendly 
territory, not to obtain information, but simply to cross our territory as 
errand boys, carrying papers which contain information. 

Is the learned counsel quite consistent, then, when he goes on to 
quote as entirely satisfactory to him, Maj. Gen. Halleck's defini- 
tion of a spy ; a definition which requires that the spy should have 
come within our limits not only to make discoveries, but " to communis 
cate to their employers the information thus obtained" ? 

This definition does not cover the case of Davis ; nor does it cover 
the case of those who come of their own accord and have no employer ; 
nor of those who are directed, or are determined, to act on the infor- 
mation they gather, instead of communicating it to any one. 

Gen. Halleck himself very properly says, that " it is the disguise or 
false pretence which constitutes the perfidy and forms the essential ele- 
ment of the crime.'' 

It is very clearly immaterial whether the spy comes as principal or 
agent, to get information for his own guidance or that of others, or 
whether the information is to be communicated, or to be retained and 
acted on without communication or consultation ; and the true defini- 
tion of a spy would include any man who comes in disguise, or clan- 
destinely, into his enemy's territory, to obtain and use, or to obtain and 
transmit information with hostile intent ; or who, being within that 
territory, treacherously seeks information to be used by himself or 
others for hostile purposes. 

In the General Orders of the War Department, No. 100 (April 24, 
1863), paragraph 88, it is said that " a spy is a person who secretly, 
in disguise or under false pretences, seeks information with the inten- 
tion of communicating it to the enemy." If to this definition had 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 81 

been added the words " or of using it as an enemy" it would, I think, 
have been exact and all comprehensive. 

But why linger and dwell in dictionaries and definitions, when, so 
far as this case is concerned, the legal character of the accused as a 
spy is settled by authority beyond all question ? 

The learned Dr. Lieber, in his letter on Guerrilla parties, thus 
states the law : 

^'' A person p'oved to he a regular soldier of the enemy's army, found 
in citizen's dress, within the lines of the captor, is universally dealt with as 
a spy." 

The learned Judge Advocate General, at the head of our Bureau 
of Military Justice, has again and again decided that the fact that " an 
officer or soldier of the rebel army comes within our lines disguised in the 
dress of a citizen, is prima facia evidence of his being a spy," and that 
" the disguise so assumed strips him of all claim to be treated as a prisoner 
of war." (Digest, p. 127.) 

It is true, as the Judge Advocate farther says : " that such evidence 
may be rebutted by proof that he had come within the lines to visit 
his family, and not for the purpose of obtaining information as a spy." 
(Digest, p. 127.) 

" It is also true, that if the spy succeeds in making his escape the 
crime does not follow him ; and if he be subsequently captured in battle, 
he cannot be tried for it." (Digest, p. 127.) 

2. The second branch of this first inquiry is now to be considered, 
viz. : what are the facts proved to which those rules of law are to be 
applied '^ 

It is proved and admitted that the accused was in the military 
and naval service of the rebel authorities. He produces his warrant as 
Master's Mate in the navy ; he told ofiicer Thomas that he was an in- 
fantry officer ; his counsel contends that in the railroad enterprise he 
was serving under Col. Martin. 

It is proved, in the second place, that he came three several times, 
in the disguise of a citizen, from Canada to Ohio and New York ; 
first, as a passenger in the steamer Philo Parsons ; next, as a railroad 
operator, when the brave party of four, Martin, Headley, Beall, and 
Anderson, attempted in vain to lift a rail from the track ; and finally, 
when that heroic band, enlarged by one new recruit, and refreshed by 
two nights of sleep at Port Colbom, returned upon their chivalric errand, 
and attacked the Dunkirk train. 

If, as the counsel for the accused argues, the statement of Anderson 

the accomplice in this railroad enterprise, is not to be believed — and all 

that you know in regard to the accused in New York, are the facts 

sworn to by Thomas, who arrested him — that he was in disguise, that 

6 



bji TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

he gave a false name, and that he made divers untrue statements in 
regard to himself ; then is his character as a spy still more strongly- 
proved, according to Mr. Brady, because he is here, a rebel officer, in 
disguise, practising deception, and without any assigned pretext or 
excuse. 

Are these two facts and the legal conclusion therefrom, met by any 
explanation, by any rebutting testimony ? 

Has any evidence been offered to change this fatal prima fades of 
the case? 

The accused came to Ohio, says Mr. Brady, to perform a belliger- 
ent act. Unfortunately there is no such proof. 

He might, says Mr. Brady, have come to Ohio and to New York 
qn some innocent errand, or some errand of humanity. He might, in- 
deed. But where is the proof that he did f 

Has he purged himself of his criminality as a spy in Ohio or New 
York? Has he, in the language of the authorities which I have read, 
returned to the belligerent army, or to the navy in which he holds 
rank, and been captured in battle ? 

This is not even claimed or argued. He did go back to Canada, 
whose neutral rights he had violated, in September. He did attempt 
to go back to Canada in December. But he did not return to the in- 
surgent States, nor was he taken prisoner in lawful or honorable 
warfare. 

Now, Mr. President and gentlemen of the Commission, I do not ask 
you to set aside, but I do ask you not to enlarge or to disregard the 
narrow limits of that rule of law which discharges from guilt a spy 
who, having returned to the field of legitimate warfare, has been cap- 
tured on the field of battle. 

This rule is arbitrary. It is an exception to the general rule of 
civilized war, which inflicts ignominious death on all who violate its 
humane regulations by acts of perfidy, baseness, and treacherous hostil- 
ity. It is your duty to see that this exception is not enlarged. 

II. I now proceed, may it please the Court, to the inquiry as to the 
law and the evidence in support of specifications 1st, 2d, and 6th, under 
Charge I. As matter of law, do the facts alleged in these specifications 
constitute violations of the laws of civilized warfare, and, as matter of 
fact, are those allegations proved ? 

I shall not spend much time in answering what was so ingeniously 
argued by the learned counsel in regard to the legal meaning of the 
word guerrilla. That word occurs only in the 6th specification, and is 
there quite immaterial — mere surplusage — and might be stricken out 
and leave that specification as complete as are the 1st and 2d specifica- 
tions. 



TKIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 83 

I might admit, for the purpose of argument, that if the word guer- 
rilla had now, and in our service, the same signification which belonged 
to it at the time when Gen. Halleck published, in San Francisco, his 
work on International Law, there would be weight as well as ingenuity 
in Mr. Brady's argument ; though even then I should ask you merely 
to omit the word in your finding of guilty on the 6th specification. But, 
as the Judge Advocate General (Digest, p. 66) informs us, this word 
guerrilla, during this unhappy war, has acquired a peculiar and well- 
settled meaning, so that it is as idle to go back to Gen. Halleck, or the 
old dictionaries or treatises, for its present significancy, as it would be 
to go back to Cicero for the laws of modern warfare. 

If the evidence in this case shows that the accused engaged in hos- 
tile acts which are forbidden by the law of war, you may call him brig- 
and or raider, guerrilla or guerriUero, prowler or robber, he is still 
amenable to this Court, whatever may have been said by writers of a 
former and less civilized period. We do not go back to Cicero, nor 
even so far as Pufendorf, Bynkershoeck, or Grotius, to discover pre- 
cisely what is now the law of war. We may go back to our Divine 
Master and His teachings in Judea, to discover the pure fountains of 
that law of love which has now found its way into the very code of war, 
and we may thence follow downward to our own day the course of 
Christianity in its influence upon Government, social institutions, and 
rules of civil conduct, and at last discover what are to-day the rules of 
civilized warfare. And in that code, as it now exists, we shall learn 
that warriors are not allowed to lay aside their uniforms, and the badges 
of their profession, to assume the disguise of peaceful citizens, to creep 
insidiously into the midst of peaceful and unsuspicious communities, and 
assassinate leading individuals, set fire at night to crowded theatres and 
hotels, or lay obstructions across railroads, and hurl men, women, and 
children indiscriminately to destruction ; and that for atrocities and in- 
famous attempts of this description, no command, no commission, no 
public manifesto, can be pleaded or proved in justification, extenuation, 
or mitigation. 

President Woolsey, in his Introduction to the Study of International 
Law (2d Ed., p. 214) observes, that among the rules which lie at the 
basis of a humane system of war, is the rule that " war is waged be- 
tween Goveraments by persons whom they authorize, and is not waged 
against the passive inhabitants of a country." 

And, as he says, the reasons why " guerrilla parties do not enjoy 
the full benefit of the laws of war, are, that they are annoying and in- 
sidious, that they put on and off with ease the character of a soldier, 
and that they are prone themselves to treat their enemies who faU into 
their hands with great severity." 



84 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

In the enunciation of these humane doctrines all the recent text 
wi'iters on public law are in harmony. But there is no work in exist- 
ence devoted specially to the subject of irregular warfare, except the 
little treatise of Dr. Lieber, from which I have abeady quoted in speak- 
ing on the subject of spies, and from which I beg leave now to read a 
few passages that bear upon this second branch of the case on trial : 

" There are cases in which the absence of a uniform may be taken 
as very serious prima facie evidence against an armed prowler or 
marauder." * * * * "It makes a great difference whether the 
absence of uniform is used for the purpose of concealment or disguise 
in order to get by stealth within the lines of the invader for the destruc- 
tion of life or property, or for pillage" — * * * * " nor can it be 
maintained in good faith, or with any respect for sound sense and judg- 
ment, that an individual — an armed prowler — shall be entitled to the 
protection of the laws of war — * * because his government or chief 
has issued a proclamation by which he calls upon the people to infest 
the bushes and commit homicides which every civilized nation will con- 
sider murders." (Pp. 16, 17.) 

" The armed prowler is a simple assassin, and wiU thus always be 
considered by soldiers and citizens." (P. 20.) 

" Armed bands that rise in the rear of an army are universally con- 
sidered, if captured, brigands, and not prisoners of war. They unite 
the fourfold character of the spy, the brigand, the assassin, and the 
rebel, and cannot expect to be treated as a fair enemy of the regular 
war." (Pp. 20, 21.) 

" No army, no society, engaged in war — * * can allow unpun- 
ished assassination, robbery, and devastation, without the deepest injiu'y 
to itself, and disastrous consequences, which might change the very issue 
of the war." (P. 22.) 

I have received from Dr. Lieber, and now propose to read as an 
authoritative exposition of the law which is to control this part of the 
case, a letter addressed to myself, and bearing date New York, February 
5th, 1865 : 

" Dear Sir ; There is no work which treats in a clear and full 
manner like a law book, on spies, and so-called guerrillas, nor on the 
law and usages of war in general. In no war previous to our present 
one have these subjects received that minute and candid attention which 
we give them, although this is a war of a lawful government with insur- 
gents. 

" Nowhere have the spy and guerrilla been treated of more dis- 
tinctly than in my pamphlet on ' Guerrilla Parties,' which the Gov- 
ernment printed, and of which I would send you a copy had I one, and 
also of General Orders No. 100 (year 1863). I must say, however, 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 86 

that in my interleaved copy of this order I have added to § 88 ' Ene- 
mies found in disguise or concealed, or lurking near the army, are by 
these facts deemed to be spies except they can prove that they are 
prisoners of war in the act of escaping.* 

" I should certainly propose to add this were I consulted as to a new 
edition. 

" I ought also to have given something on enemies who in disguise 
come from the. territory of a neutral to commit robbery or murder, and 
those who may come from such territory in uniform. 

''' I donH believe that such people, now called by the unaccepAable term 
RAIDERS, have ever been treated of by any writer. 

" The thing created no doubt in the mind of any one. They have 
always been treated as brigands, and it can easily be shown upon principle 
that they cannot be treated otherwise. 

" Never, so long as men have warred with one another — and that is 
pretty much as long as there have existed sufficient numbers to do so — 
has any belligerent been insolent enough to claim the protection of the laws 
of war for banditti who take passage on board a vessel, and then rise 
upon the captain and crew, or who gather in the territory of a friendly 
person, steal in disguise into the country of their enemy, and there com- 
mit murder or robbery. The insolence — I use the term now in a scien- 
tific meaning — the absurdity, and reckless disregard of honor, which 
characterize this proceeding, fairly stagger a jurist or a student of his- 
tory. * * *. 

'' Your obedient servant, Francis Lieber." 

This, gentlemen of the Commission, is the voice of the law speak- 
ing from the lips of the living jurist — of that learned and eminent juris- 
consult whom our Government, in the beginning of 1863, saw fit» first 
to consult and then to employ in drafting that manual of " Instructions 
for the Government of Armies of the United States in the Field," which, 
having been " approved by the President," became the will of the War 
Department, and was published as that " General Order No. 100," 
from which I have already quoted in the course of my argument. 

With one reference to that order, from which I now read paragraph 
101, I will close my citation of the authorities which determine the law 
applicable to the case now on trial : 

" 101. While deception in war is admitted as a just and necessary 
means of hostility, and is consistent with honorable warfare, the com- 
mon law of war allows even capital punishment for clandestine or 
treacherous attempts to injure an enemy, because they are so dangerous, 
and it is so difficult to guard against them." 

Reference was made by the counsel for the accused to the trials in 



86 TRIAL. OF JOHN Y. BE ALL. 

New York and Philadelphia, upon the charge of pkacy, of certain 
rebel privateer smen. Let me remind this Court, that in those cases the 
civil judge, as r&atter of law, determined that the parties thus tried, 
though sheltered by a rebel commission, were pirates. It was execu- 
tive policy, and not the law, which led to their exc^jange as prisoners 
of war. 

The case of the steamer Caroline and the Canadian McLeod, to 
which Mr. Brady has alluded, can shed no light upon the present trial. 
England and the United States were friendly, not belligerent powers, 
and those border difficulties were adjusted without recourse to the laws 
of war. 

And now, Mr. President, I come to the final inquiry in this most in- 
teresting and important trial. What are the facts proved by the evi- 
dence under the 1st, 2d, and 6th Specifications of Charge 1st? 

I submit to the Court that we have proved, 

1st. That the accused was and is a rebel officer. 

2d. That he was within our lines in disguise. 

3d. That he, at Kelly's Island, in Ohio, in September last, with 
the help of other rebel officers and soldiers in disguise, seized the Amer- 
ican private steamboat Philo Parsons. 

4th. That he stole the money aud destroyed the fi'eight on board of 
her. 

5th. That in September, at Middle Bass Island, in Ohio, he, still in 
disguise, and -with the same friends in disguise, seized in like manner 
another steamboat, the Island Queen, and scuttled and sunk her. 

6th. That in December he came from Canada to Buffalo, in New 
York, in disguise, and with other disguised rebel officers and soldiers 
attempted unsuccessfully to throw a railroad train from the track. 

7th. That he went back to Canada, and again returned in the same 
treacherous manner as before, and repeated his infamous attempt upon 
a night train from Dunkirk, and was caught as he fled from the scene 
of his unenviable exploits. 

The evidence upon these points is not contradicted, and admits of no 
denial or doubt. I respectfully submit to the Court that the acts thus 
proved, having been done within our lines by rebel enemies in disguise, 
upon the persons and property of peaceable, unoffending, unsuspicious 
citizens, are acts of irregular warfare — call them raiding, brigandage, 
robbery, theft, piracy, plunder, murder, or assassination — are offences 
against the laws of God and the laws of man, against municipal law 
and the laws of war, and may be tried and punished by either municipal 
courts of civil jurisdiction, by court-martial, or by military commission. 
They are brought before you for trial. Yours is a rightful jurisdiction. 



TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 87 

Upon you devolves the solemn duty of determining the issues in this 
ease, which, to the accused, are the dread issues of life and death. 

I have felt, Mr. President and gentlemen, oppressed, as I know you 
all must feel, with the terrible responsibility imposed upon me, and 
upon you, by the facts and the law in this case. But it is not a matter 
in which the dread of responsibility must be allowed to influence either 
your action or mine. It is important that you and I, sir, and our wives 
and children — that all of our fellow-citizens, may feel when they enter 
a railroad car within the loyal States that they are safe from all 
perils but those of ordinary travel ; and that if any party of rebel sol- 
diers in disguise, enemies of the Republic and friends of the Confed- 
eracy, attempt to place obstructions on the track, and throw off the 
train, they will be punished with the most exemplary speed, certainty, 
and severity. Enormities like this cannot be justified or screened from 
legal vengeance by the pleaorproof of a military commission, command, 
or ratification, no matter how exalted may be the rank of the com- 
mander ; since the law of war, which forbids and punishes the crime, 
is obligatory upon all. 

It must have been apparent to you, gentlemen of the Commission, 
that in the conduct of the defence the accused was utterly embarrassed, 
perplexed, and at a loss to know how to protect himself ; and that he 
was compelled to resoi't to two distinct, incongruous, and contradictory 
lines of defence : at one time seeking to escape from the jurisdiction of 
this Court by treating his acts as mere civil offences ; and at another 
time claiming the protection of the laws of war as a legitimate and 
regular belligerent, acting in obedience to the lawful commands of his 
superior officers. Neither of these lines of defence, I respectfully sub- 
mit, can stand for one moment against the charge and pressure of the 
law and the facts. 

The accused, knowing the terrible risk he assumed, knowing the 
peril under which he acted, entered upon a scheme of illegal warfare 
upon the lake and upon the land. Some one on board the captured 
steamers uttered the foolish assertion, that with the stolen boats they 
meant to capture the U. S. armed steamer Michigan. Every move- 
ment of those captured boats proves the falsehood of that pretence. 
Not one single mile, not a rod, not an inch, did either of those vessels 
move under rebel direction toward that ship of war. 

An act of lawful war ! Seizing two passenger steamers, robbing 
the clerk, throwing overboard the freight, committing the crimes of 
pirates and of thieves, and not moving one barley corn of distance 
toward what is pretended to be the object and end of their warlike 
enterprise ! Such a case does not admit of argument. 

And so in regard to the defence of that scandalous attempt upon 



88 TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

the train — that it was a simple attempt at robbery, and a mere civil 
offence, on the part of this " humane and conscientious" prisoner and his 
worthy associates, who with a .force of five men, armed with five re- 
volvers, a sledge-hammer, and a cold chisel, expected to capture a train 
of fifteen cars and fifteen hundred passengers, and to plunder the ex- 
press-man's iron safe ! It is a glaring absurdity. Why, sir, the mo- 
ment the train halted and they saw the approach of three or four lan- 
terns, this squad of express robbers jumped into their sleigh and fled 
for the Canada border ! 

All the evidence in this case, may it please the Court, tends to show 
that the accused was part and parcel of a wide-spread scheme of un- 
lawful and irregular warfare along our whole Canadian line ; whose 
purpose was, in any way and in every way, except by open and honor- 
able hostility, to endanger the lives, destroy the property, and weaken 
the strength of those Yankee citizens whom these brigands of the bor- 
der so bitterly hate. 

The piracy of the lake, and the outrage on the railroad, were parts 
of that system of irregular warfare, under the fear of which no man, 
woman, or child can sleep with any feeling of security in our midst. 
Such atrocities are attempts, on the part of the rebel officers and sol- 
diers who engage in and countenance them, to brmg. back war to its old 
condition of barbarism — to imitate the stealthy cruelty of the North 
American savage, who creeps under cover of midnight upon his unsus- 
pecting victim, and smites him to death ere the sound of approaching 
footsteps has roused that victim from slumber. With the accused this 
savage purpose takes form in the robbery of steamboats and the de- 
struction of railroad trains and travellers. In other hands, it manifests 
itself in midnight attempts to burn great cities. There is nothing of 
Christian civilization, nothing of regular warfare, nothing of a high, 
noble, bold, manly, chivalrous character about it. It is an outbreak of 
passions so bad and violent that they have overcome all the native ele- 
ments of manliness, and have led men, of whom four years ago to have 
suspected such things possible would have been a calumny and. a crime, 
to indulge in atrocities from month to month and year to year, such as 
have not stained the pages of warfare for two hundred years. And 
you sit here to-day, and I stand here to-day, as the representatives of 
recoguized law and honorable warfare, to see that such outrages, when 
they are clearly and distinctly brought home to the guilty party by the 
evidence adduced upon the trial, shall not escape unpunished. 



These proceedings having been submitted to Major Gen. John A. 
Dix, the Major General in command of the Department, he indorsed 
thereon his approval, and issued the following order : 

LoFC. 



TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 89 

The order of Maj. Gen. Dix upon this case is as follows : 
General Orders ) 

No. 14. f Headquarters Department of the East, i 

New York City, Feb. \Wi, 1865. ] 

I. Before a Military Commission which convened at Fort Lafayette, 
New York Harbor, by virtue of Special Orders No. 14, current series 
from these headquarters, of January 17, 1865, and of which Brigadier 
General Fitz Henry Warren, United States Volunteers, is president, 
was arraigned and tried John Y. Beall. 

****** 

[Here follow the charges and specifications, and the finding of 

sentence.] 

n. In reviewing the proceedings of the Commission, the circumstan- 
ces on which the charges are founded, and the questions of law raised 
on the trial, the Major General commanding has given the most earnest 
and careful consideration to them all. The testimony shows that the 
accused, while holding a commission from the authorities at Richmond 
as Acting Master in the navy of the insurgent States, embarked at 
Sandwich, Canada, on board the Philo Parsons^ an unarmed steamer, 
while on one of her regular trips, carrying passengers and freight from 
Detroit, in the State of Michigan, to Sandusky, in the State of Ohio. 
The Captain had been induced by Burley, one of the confederates of 
the accused, to land at Sandwich, which was not one of the regular 
stopping-places of the steamer, for the purpose of receiving them. 
Here the accused and two others took passage. At Maiden, another 
Canadian port, and one of the regular stopping-places, about twenty- 
five more came on board. The accused was in citizen's dress, showing 
no insignia of his rank or profession, embarking as an ordinary passen- 
ger, and representing himself to be on a pleasure trip to Kelly's Island, 
in Lake Erie, within the jurisdiction of the State of Ohio. 

After eight hours, he and his associates, arming themselves with re- 
volvers and hand-axes, brought surreptitiously on board, rose on the 
crew, took possession of the steamer, threw overboard part of the 
freight, and robbed the clerk of the money in his charge, putting aU on 
board under duress. Later in the evening he and his party took pos- 
session of another unarmed steamer (the Island Queen), scuttled her, 
and sent her adrift on the lake. These transactions occurred within 
the jurisdiction of the State of Ohio, on the 19th day of September, 

1864. 

On the 16th day of December, 1865, the accused was arrested near 
the Suspension Bridge, over the Niagara River, within the State of 
New York. The testimony shows that he and two officers of the insur- 



90 TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

gent States, Colonel Martin and Lieutenant Headley, with two other 
confederates, had made an unsuccessful attempt, under the direction of 
the first-named officer, to throw the passenger train coming from the 
"West to Buffalo off the railroad track, for the purpose of robbing the 
express company. It is further shown that this was the third attempt 
in which the accused was concerned to accomplish the same object ; 
that between two of these attempts the party, including the accused, 
went to Canada and returned, and that they were on their way back to 
Canada when he was arrested. In these transactions, as in that on 
Lake Erie, the accused, though holding a commission from the insur- 
gent authorities at Richmond, was in disguise, procuring information, 
with the intention of using it, as he subsequently did, to inflict injury 
upon unarmed citizens of the United States and their private property. 
The substance of the charges against the accused is, that he was acting 
as a spy, and carrying on irregular or guerrilla warfare against the 
United States ; in other words, he was acting in the twofold character 
of a spy and a guerrillero. He was found guilty on both charges, and 
sentenced to death ; and the Major General commanding fully concurs 
in the judgment of the Commission. In all the transactions with which 
he was implicated — in one as a chief, and in the others as a subordinate 
agent — ^he was not only acting the part of a spy, in procuring informa- 
tion to be used for hostile purposes, but he was also committing acts 
condemned by the common judgment and the common conscience of all 
civilized States, except when done in open warfare by avowed enemies. 
Throughout these transactions, he was not only in disguise, but person- 
ating a false character. It is not at aU essential to the purpose of sus- 
taining the finding of the Commission, and yet it is not inappropriate 
to state, as an indication of the animus of the accused and his confeder- 
ates, that the attempts to throw the railroad train off the track were 
made at night, when the obstruction would be less likely than in the 
daytime to be noticed by the engineer or conductor, thus putting in 
peril the lives of hundreds of men, women, and children. In these at- 
tempts three ofiicers holding commissions in the military service of the 
insurgent States were concerned. The accused is shown by the testi- 
mony to be a man of education and refinement, and it is difiicult to ac- 
count for his agency in transactions so abhorrent to the moral sense, 
and so inconsistent with all the rules of honorable warfare. 

The accused, in justification of the transaction on Lake Erie, pro- 
duced the manifesto of Jefferson Davis, assuming the responsibility of 
the act, and declaring that it was done by his authority. It is hardly 
necessary to say that no such assumption can sanction an act not war- 
ranted by the laws of civilized warfare. If Mr. Davis were at the 
head of an independent government, recognized as such by other 



TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 91 

nations, he would have no power to sanction what the usages of civilized 
states have condemned. The Government of the United States, from a 
desire to mitigate the asperities of war, has given to the insurgents of 
the South the benefit of the rules which govern sovereign States in the 
conduct of hostilities with each other ; and any violation of those rules 
should, for the sake of good order here, and the cause of humanity 
throughout the world, be visited with the severest penalty. War, under 
its mildest aspects, is the heaviest calamity that can befall our race ; 
and he who, in a spirit of revenge, or with lawless violence, transcends 
the limits to which it is restricted by the common behest of all Chris- 
tian communities, should receive the punishment which the common 
voice has declared to be due to the crime. The Major General com- 
manding feels that a want of firmness and inflexibility, on his part, in 
executing the sentence of death in such a case, would be an ofience 
against the outraged civilization and humanity of the age. 

It is hereby ordered that the accused, John Y. Beall, be hanged by 
the neck till he is dead, on Governor's Island, on Saturday, the 18th day 
of February, inst., between the hours of 12 and 2 in the afternoon. 

The commanding officer at Fort Columbus is charged with the 
execution of this order. 

By command of Major Gen» Dix. 

D. T. Van Buren, Col. A. A.G. 



On the 17th February the execution of the sentence against Beall 
was suspended by the following order, viz. : 

Headquarters Department of the East, |_ 



New York City, Feb. VjtJi, 186;: 

I 



Commanding Officer Fort Columbus, 

New York Harbor. 
You will suspend the execution of the sentence of John Y. Beall 
until further orders. 

By command of Major General Dix, 
(Signed) D. T. Van Buren, 

Colonel and Assistant Adjutant General. 



On the same day an order was issued reconvening the Commission. 
This order, and the proceedings of the Commission in obedience thereto, 
appear from the following record : 



92 TRIAL OF JOHN Y. BEALL. 

Headquarters Department of the East, ) 

New York City, Feb. 2()th, 1865, 11 o'clock A. M. J 

The Commission appointed by Special Orders No. 14, par. 6, froin 
these Headquarters, dated Jan. 17, 1865, reassembled in obedience to 
the following order : 



Special Orders 

No. 42. 



Headquarters Department of the East, 

New York City, February 17th, 1865. 



1. The Military Commission of which Brigadier General Fitz 
Henry Warren, U. S. Vols., is President, and which was convened pur- 
suant to Special Orders No. 14, current series from these Headquarters, 
N. Y. City, will reassemble at these Headquarters to-morrow at 10 
o'clock A. M., or as soon hereafter as practicable, for the purpose of 
reconsideration of the finding in the case of John Y. Beall, for reasons 
more particularly set forth in communication herewith enclosed from 
the Major General Commanding the Department. 

By command of Major General Dix, 
(Signed) D. T. Van Bcren, 

Assistant Adjutant General. 
Present, all the members of the Commission, viz. : 

Brig. General Fitz Henry Warren, U. S. V. 
Brig. General W. H. Morris, U. S. V. 
Colonel M. S. Howe, 3d U. S. Cav. 
Colonel H. Day, U. S. Army. 

Brev. Lieut. Col. R. F. O'Bierne, 14th U. S. Infantry. 
Major G. W. Wallace, 6th U. S. Infantry. 
Present, also, the Judge Advocate. The Commission was cleared 
for deliberation. 

The foregoing order was read aloud by the Judge Advocate. 

The President then read the following communication from the 
Major General Commanding : 

Headquarters Department of the East, ) 
New York City, February 18th, 1865. ) 

General : I have suspended the order for the execution of John Y. 
Beall, and have reconvened your Military Commission, that I might 
send the proceedings in that case back to the Commission for a revision 
of the findings therein. 

I would particularly call the attention of the Commission to the 
finding upon the 3d Specification under Charge 2d. 



TEIAL OF JOHN Y. BE ALL. 93 

A familiar rule of law requires that the finding should meet, and 
affirm or deny, every averment in the Specification. This is not done 
by the present finding, except by implication. The finding negatives 
the averment of date, and omits all mention of the other averments, 
leaving it to be inferred that the Commission considered the Specifica- 
tion sustained by the proof in every other particular. If such were the 
opinion of the Commission, the rule of law to which I have referred 
would be complied with by finding the accused " Guilty, omitting the 
word September, and substituting the word December;" or, "Not 
Guilty as to the day averred, but guilty of acting as a spy, at or near 
Suspension Bridge, in the State of New York, on or about December 
16, 1864." 

The Commission may deem it well to consider and determine once 
more whether the proof under Specifications 1 and 2, charge 2d, estab- 
lishes the characteristics of a spy, viz., an enemy clandestinely within 
our lines to obtain information to be used for hostile purposes. 

I do not make this last suggestion for the purpose of raising a doubt 
in regard to the correctness of the finding, but that the judgment of the 
Commission may be placed beyond all question. 

I am, very respectfully, yours, 

John A. Dix, 

Major General. 
Brig. General Fitz Henry "Warren, 

President Military Commission. 
The Commission then reopened the case of John Y. Beall, and re- 
considered the finding upon Specification 3d under Charge 2d. 

Upon careful consideration of the evidence recorded in the proceed- 
ings, the Commission find the accused, John Y. Beall, of Specification 
3d under Charge 2d not guilty as to the day aveiTed, but guilty of act- 
ing as a spy at or near Suspension Bridge, in the State of New York, 
on or about Dec. 16, 1864. 

After careful deliberation the Commission find no reason to recon- 
sider their finding on either Charge, or any other Specification, and do 
therefore reaffirm their sentence, two-thirds of the members of the Com- 
mission concurring therein. 

(Signed) Fitz Henry Warren, 

Brigadier General U. S, Volunteers, President. 
John A. Bolles, 

Major and Aide-de-camp, 

Judge Advocate. 
These Proceedings were laid before the Major General commanding, 
who endorsed thereon the following approval and order, on the 21st ©f 
February, Tuesday : 



94: TRIAL OF JOHN T. BEALL. 

The proceedings, finding, and sentence are approved, and the accused, 
John Y. Beall, will be hanged by the neck till he is dead, on Governor's 
Island, on Friday, the 24th day of February, 1865. The commanding 
officer at Fort Columbus is charged with the execution of this order. 
(Signed) John A. Dix, 

Major General Commanding. 



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make the present a fit epoch for our undertaking. 



The work will be divided into three Periods, each complete in itself, and 
will form Eight Volumes in Demy Octavo. 
I. — Ancient Histoey, Sacred and Secular ; from the Creation to the Fall of 

the Western Empire, in A. D. 476. Two Volum.es. 
II.— Medieval History, Cival and Ecclesiastical; from the Fall of the 

Western Empire to the taking of Constantinople by the Turks, in A. D. 

1453. Two Volumes. 
III. — Modern History ; from the Fall of the Byzantine Empire to our own 

Times. Four Volumes. 
It will be published in 8 vols., 8vo. Price in cloth $3 50 per vol. 
Sheep $4 50. Volume 1 now ready. 



NEW YORK: D. APPLETON & CO., Publishers. 



D. APPLETON & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. 



THE 

NEW AMERICAN CYCLOPJIDIA. 

EDITED BY 

GEORGE RIPLEY AND CHARLES A. DANA. 

PUBLISHED BY 

D. APPLETON & COMPANY, NEW YORK. 
In 16 Vols. 8vo, Double Columns, 750 pages each. 

Price, Cloth, $5.00; Sheep, $6,00; Half Morocco, $6.50; Half Russia, $7.50 joer Vol. 



Every one that reads, every one that mingles in society, is constantly 
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the family, practical questions are continually arising, which no man, well 
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